STUDIES 
CHARACTER 


CAROL  NORTON 


Studies   in    Character 


First  Printing,  June,  1906 
Second     "  Sept.,    " 

Third        "  Oct.,     " 

Fourth      "  Nov.,   " 

Fifth  "  Dec,    " 


Studies  in  Character 

BY 

CAROL  NORTON,  C.S.D. 

Author  of  "  Woman's  Cause"  "  The  New   World" 
"  Poems  and  Verses  " 


BOSTON    <**    DANA    ESTES    & 
COMPANY   *    PUBLISHERS 


Copyright,  1906 
By  Dana  Estes  &  Company 


All  rights  reserved 


COLONIAL  PRESS 
Printed  by  C.  H .  Simonds  <5r»  Co- 
Bos:  on,  U .  S.  A  . 


BJ 

/r 

TABLE  OF  CONTENTS. 

N?2, 

PAGE. 

Studies  in  Character     .... 

I  I 

15 

3° 

40 

The  Lesson  of  Suffering 

50 

Friendship     .... 

59 

Personality,  Impersonality,  Individuality 

72 

To  Understand  and  to  be  Understood 

88 

Criticism  as  a  Habit       .... 

IOI 

no 

Right  Human  Relations 

118 

True  Faith             .... 

127 

137 

150 

The  Divine  Vista 

157 

The  Priceless  Birthright 

161 

The  Abiding  Presence  of  Christ 

164 

170 

The  Liberal  Christian 

176 

Victory  Over  Fear 

184 

&• 


1 


STUDIES  IN  CHARACTER. 

We  are  all  better  not  worse  than  we  picture 
ourselves  to  be.  Self-depreciation  is  often  mis- 
taken for  humility,  while  on  the  other  hand  self- 
exaggeration  frequently  usurps  the  throne  of 
genuine  self-knowledge.  True  character,  and  the 
knowledge  thereof,  invariably  lies  within  the  inter- 
mediate space  between  the  extremes  of  human 
estimate  of  individual  worth.  Above  the  person, 
frail,  imperfect  and  human,  towers  the  noble  indi- 
vidual whose  Ego  is  the  Deity,  whose  abiding 
place  is  perfection,  and  whose  destiny  is  immortal 
dominion  over  the  lesser  creations  of  infinite 
Mind.  Honesty  to  one's  self  is  as  important  as  to 
one's  fellow  men.  Dignified  and  sincere  self-con- 
fidence, if  built  upon  a  foundation  of  spiritual 
strength  and  demonstrable  ability,  is  not  egotism 
but  symmetrical   individualism.      Men  rise  in  the 

ii 


12  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

scale  of  being  through  trust  in  their  divine  charac- 
teristics, which  in  some  instances  abide  like  certain 
treasures  near  the  surface  of  their  minds,  while  in 
other  cases  virtue,  and  the  strength  it  begets,  lie 
deep  in  the  nature,  latent  in  consciousness.  Most 
men  manifest  certain  cardinal  virtues  with  conspic- 
uous force,  even  if  such  virtues  are  surrounded 
with  many  weeds  of  human  nature.  If  men  are 
approached,  dealt  with,  and  reasonably  trusted 
upon  the  basis  of  these  visible  strong  points,  they 
usually  respond  to  our  advances,  give  us  their  con- 
fidence, and  allow  us  to  help  them.  Society  and 
life  is  founded  upon  a  basis  of  divine  reciprocity. 
We  are  rich  as  we  give ;  we  live  in  proportion  to 
the  unselfishness  of  our  love,  and  we  become  poor 
in  the  ratio  that  we  indulge  habits  of  introspection, 
self-centered  interest  and  personal  gain.  Pure  self- 
less love  increases  through  reflection  and  radiation, 
not  through  processes  of  exclusiveness  or  person- 
ality. Heaven  is  to  us  an  individual  kingdom  of 
immortal  bliss,  if  we  seek  it  for  its  own  glory  of 
idealism.     But  if  fear  be  the  motive  power  that 


STUDIES    IN    CHARACTER.  1 3 

actuates  our  steps  toward  its  portals,  it  has  for  us 
"no  glory,  no  light  nor  sunshine  pure."  Good  is 
its  own  best  friend  and  rewarder,  and  vice  and  dis- 
honesty their  own  worst  enemies  and  destroyers. 
Men  come  closest  to  their  true  selves  in  the  sober 
moments  of  life,  under  the  chastening  shadows  of 
sorrow  and  loss;  also  through  the  operation  of 
contrasting  their  own  with  stronger  and  grander 
natures.  Comparisons  are  often  helpful,  frequently 
discouraging,  sometimes  harmful.  Life  is  made 
up  of  states  and  stages  of  comparison.  The  laws 
of  progression  and  evolution  involve  constant  com- 
parisons of  the  attainments  and  possessions  of 
yesterday  with  the  added  gains  of  to-day.  Invol- 
untarily our  thoughts  enter  into  processes  of  com- 
parison. To  the  extent  only  that  this  habit  begets 
increased  activity  and  optimism  can  it  be  said  to 
be  a  legitimate  one.  The  ever-present  to-day  is 
the  raw  material  out  of  which  to-morrow  is  made. 
Our  pasts  are  dead,  lifeless,  and  are  of  value  to  us 
in  the  practical  now  of  to-day  only  as  their  deep 
lessons  have  been  intelligently  assimilated.     The 


14  STUDIES   IN    CHARACTER. 

present,  therefore,  predicts  and  predestines  the 
character  of  the  future.  The  eternal  now  of  eter- 
nity bids  us  live  one  day  at  a  time  and  look  above, 
not  backward,  nor  beneath,  nor  speculatively  for- 
ward, but  heavenward  and  Godward,  for  there 
alone  is  life  and  blessedness.  Vain  regrets  for  the 
past  are  of  no  avail,  nor  is  chronic  penitence  and 
sorrow  for  erring  action  or  wrong  living,  reason- 
able or  helpful.  To  regret  one's  errors  to  the 
point  of  not  repeating  them  is  true  repentance. 
Emotional  reactionary  habits  of  thought  are  not 
conducive  to  stability  of  character,  nor  to  the  evo- 
lution of  ideal  manhood  and  womanhood.  Our 
ideals  are  glimpses  of  our  own  divine  individualities 
which  reflect  the  infinite  perfection  that  we  call 
God.  To  know  the  future  with  prophetic  foresight 
is  to  be  mentally  in  advance  of  the  average  mind, 
to  enter  some  promised  land  of  spiritual  discern- 
ment before  the  masses  gain  its  borders,  or  to  live 
on  the  heights  of  sinless  thought  viewing  the  great 
world  of  transcendentalism. 


LOVE. 
I. 

God  is  Love  and  whosoever  abideth  in  Love  abideth  in 
God  and  God  in  him. — John. 

In  one  of  the  eastern  religions  the  most  revered 
and  loved  name  for  God  is  Smiling  Mother.  The 
disciple  who  wrote  the  most  metaphysical  of  the 
four  Gospels  and  left  to  humanity  the  rich  spiritual 
legacy  of  the  Patmos  revelation,  defines  the  eternal 
Father  and  Mother,  God,  the  Creator  of  the  uni- 
verse and  man,  as  Love.  Love  is  therefore  not 
one  of  the  names  of  God,  nor  a  name  for  God,  but 
Love  is  the  All  in  All  God.  It  is  the  universal 
creator  of  man  and  the  universe ;  the  Ego  of  all 
distinctive  individuality ;  the  essence  of  being,  the 
origin  and  ultimate  of  all  existence.  The  universal 
life  energy  is  therefore  the  immanent  Love.  As 
there  is  but  one  God,  or  divine  nature,  there  can 

*5 


l6  STUDIES    IN    CHARACTER. 

therefore  be  but  one  Love,  which  is  not  only  the 
Ego  of  man,  but  is  his  spiritual  life-breath,  charac- 
ter and  mind.  The  love  of  Love  is  the  love  of 
God,  alias  Good,  Truth,  Beauty,  Pure  Mind.  Real 
love  is  therefore  immaterial,  spiritual,  supersensual, 
relating  to  Mind  or  Spirit,  not  matter  or  material- 
ism. The  immanent  God  is  the  everpresence  of 
Love.  A  correct  and  justifiable  analysis  of  love 
leads  to  the  deduction,  that  because  there  is  no  hu- 
man God,  no  material  deity,  there  is  no  such  thing 
as  merely  human  love,  nor  any  real  affection  that 
can  be  termed  passionate  or  sensual.  Love,  tender, 
longsuffering,  patient,  forbearing,  compassionate, 
optimistic,  hopeful,  believing,  faithful,  constant, 
honest,  truthful,  beauteous  in  purity,  is  the  loving 
countenance  of  Divinity  turned  forever  toward  Her 
creatures.  To  live,  move,  and  have  one's  being  in 
God  means  daily  life  made  progressively  at-one 
with  the  Good  that  is  Love  and  the  Love  that  is 
Truth.  As  there  is  but  one  God  there  is  but  one 
love.  Therefore  the  same  quality  of  love  should 
be  exchanged  between  God's  children,  or  ideas,  as 


LOVE.  17 

is  offered  by  the  worshipping,  adoring  heart  to  the 
creative  Love  called  God.    The  eternal  Justice  and 
the    everlasting    Love   are    one.      The  essence  of 
divine  Justice  is  that  redemptive  mercy  and  com- 
passion which  sustains  the  eternal  law  of  cause  and 
effect,  yet  affirms  that  "whatsoever  a  man  soweth 
that  shall  he  also  reap."     Its  discipline  has  forever 
as  its  sole  end  the  regeneration  and  salvation  of 
the  sinner.     The  divine  Love  is  ever  united  to  the 
eternal  Justice,  which  pardons  only  as  sin   is  for- 
saken, and  is  ever  merciful  and  tenderly  solicitous 
toward  the  penitential  and  ascending  heart  of  the 
wrong-doer  honestly  turning  from  its  error.     The 
exquisite  commingling  of  the  love  that  is  just  and 
the  justice  that  is  loving  in  the  words  and  acts  of 
the  Teacher  of  Palestine  reveal  to  men  that  inter- 
mediate   and    scientific    mastery    of    Love,    which 
should  reveal  to  the  mind  of  Christendom  the  per- 
verted sense  that  Athanasius,  Calvin  and  Edwards 
got  of  the  eternal  justice  of  the  Godhead.     This 
same    humanized    sense   of   cold,    heartless,   cruel 
justice,  minus  the  saving  love  element,  has  for  ages 


I 8  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

given  a  false  and  literal  interpretation  to  the 
Pauline  philosophy  and  is  responsible  for  the 
wholesale  removal  of  the  Johannean  love-interpre- 
tation from  the  superstructure  of  Christ's  teachings 
and  religion.  A  perverted  sense  of  reverence  and 
a  sentimentality  as  offensive  as  it  is  weak,  would 
have  men  believe  that  every  attempt  to  understand 
the  nature  of  God  must  end  in  pitiful  failure. 
When  the  Christian  Bible  commands  man  to  ac- 
quaint himself  with  God  and  be  at  peace,  when  it 
is  remembered  that  the  Founder  of  the  religion 
that  is  destined  to  become  universal  among  the 
races  on  earth  said,  "Ye  shall  know  the  truth  and 
the  truth  shall  make  you  free,"  and  straightway 
promised  that  the  Spirit  of  Truth  would  come  into 
the  world  to  abide  in  it  as  a  perpetual  Comforter, 
Healer,  and  Saviour,  wherein  consists  the  egotism 
of  the  man  or  woman  who  says  that  the  only  sal- 
vation is  in  the  definite  understanding  of  the  nature 
of  God?  The  ancient  and  outworn  hallucination 
that  God  dwells  in  a  universe  of  His  own  apart 
from  the  daily  affairs  of  life,  is  fast  passing  away, 


LOVE.  19 

and  the  immanent  God  is  being  understood  as  the 
everpresence,  omnipotence,  and  omniscience  of 
Life,  Truth,  and  Love.  This  three-fold  and  united 
Principle  of  being,  is  to  be  utilized  as  the  elimi- 
nator of  sin,  the  healer  of  disease,  and  the  de- 
stroyer of  death.  Man  must  find  his  true  selfhood 
in  Love,  for  God  being  his  Ego,  or  Creator,  is  at 
once  the  essence  of  his  nature,  the  origin  of  his 
identity,  and  the  ultimate  of  his  immortal  exist- 
ence. Love  is  termed  the  universal  instinct,  but  is 
the  love  here  referred  to  mutable  or  immutable, 
passionate  or  pure,  physical,  corporeal,  and  mate- 
rial or  metaphysical,  incorporeal,  and  immaterial? 
Is  it  changeable,  capricious,  losing  itself  in  per- 
sonal animosity,  hatred,  and  ofttimes  murder?  Or 
is  it  synonymous  with  that  Love  that  is  everlast- 
ingly patient  and  forever  forgiving?  The  tradi- 
tional theologies  and  dogmas  of  the  religious  sys- 
tems of  the  world  have  been  made  increasingly 
mystical  and  far-fetched.  They  have  thus  bewild- 
ered the  minds  which  they  should  have  enlight- 
ened,   and    alienated    the    heart-love    that   should 


20  STUDIES   IN    CHARACTER. 

have  been  enlisted  in  the  love  of  God  and  in  the 
establishment  of  loving  fellowship  among  the  men 
and  women  of  earth.  Therefore,  the  majority  of  the 
people  of  earth  have  had  presented  to  their  minds 
such  an  unlovable  God,  or  heavenly  Father,  and 
such  an  intensely  unreasonable  and  cruel  scheme 
of  salvation,  that  human  love  with  all  its  material- 
ism and  limitation  has  been  depended  upon  and 
perpetuated  even  while  recognized  as  containing 
within  itself  the  primal  elements  of  earthly  discord 
and  human  woe.  Truly  speaking,  love  is  the  uni- 
versal instinct.  It  is  the  poetry  of  life  and  each 
line  is  ever  new.  But  this  universal  instinct  is  that 
supersensual  instinct  which  in  itself  can  be  termed 
spiritual  intuition.  It  enables  us  to  behold  the 
face  of  the  Father,  purifies  our  hearts,  enlarges  the 
scope  of  the  mind,  enhances  the  mental  faculties, 
spiritualizes  joy,  clarifies  emotion,  gives  poise  to 
enthusiasm,  and  poetic  ascension  to  thought.  For 
personality  it  gives  impersonality;  for  human 
greed,  avarice,  and  selfishness  it  begets  the  creative 
and  expanding  genius  of  philanthropy,  unselfish- 


LOVE.  21 

ness,  and  tender  ministry;  it  is  the  universal 
language  of  the  heart;  it  opens  the  windows  of  the 
soul  to  the  light  of  faith,  chastity,  and  constancy; 
it  tells  man  of  the  one  universal  nature  expressing 
itself  through  the  universe ;  and  in  the  character 
of  his  brother  and  sister,  it  promotes  fellowship,  in- 
creases hospitality,  findeth  its  own  in  another's 
good,  mourns  with  those  who  mourn,  weeps  with 
those  who  weep,  rejoices  with  those  who  conquer, 
and  finds  exquisite  delight  in  rejoicing  in  the  vic- 
tories, as  well  as  sympathizing  with  the  defeats  of 
the  sons  and  daughters  of  earth.  It  speaks  clearest 
to  the  purified  heart.  As  the  telescope  reveals  an 
infinite  number  of  worlds  beyond  the  vision  of  the 
naked  eye,  as  the  finer  instruments  tell  of  a  uni- 
verse of  sound  beneath  the  hearing  of  the  natural 
ear,  so  this  love  reveals  to  the  pure  in  heart  an 
infinitude  of  worlds  and  a  Heaven  of  harmonies 
above  the  earth-vision  of  that  misguided  instinct 
and  personal  sense  so  often  confounded  with  love. 
Love  lives  and  increases  her  store  by  giving.  Her 
genius  is  in  sharing  all  that  she  possesses  and  all 


22  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER 

that  she  is.  Love  is  reciprocal.  Love  gives  with- 
out thinking  of  return.  Love  is  honest  and  pa- 
tient, though  all  about  her  be  faithless,  dishonest, 
and  turbulent.  Love  knows  how  to  wait,  and  be- 
cause she  waits  trustingly  and  fearlessly  she  re- 
ceives the  victor's  crown  as  queen  of  the  divine 
graces.  Love  is  divinely  impartial ;  her  fragrance, 
like  that  of  the  lily-of-the-valley,  is  begotten  oft- 
times  from  life's  shadows  rather  than  from  its  sun- 
shine. Love  exhales  the  aroma  of  chaste  affection 
because  she  is  incorporeally  existent  as  mind,  not 
in  any  way  allied  to  matter  or  materialism.  This 
love  glorified  the  passion  of  Jesus  and  sustained 
his  magnificent  self-offering.  Love  defines  true 
instinct  as  the  evidence  and  testimony  of  the 
spiritual  senses,  forever  existing  as  the  intuitive 
consciousness  of  the  divine  origin  of  man.  Apart 
from  the  common  walks  of  earthly  living  she  moves 
with  stately  step ;  reaching  down  helpfully  and 
with  a  humanity  of  feeling  akin  to  parental  sym- 
pathy, she  penetrates  the  minutiae  of  human  affairs, 
and  forever  leads  the  way,  saying  to  earth's  weary 


LOVE.  23 

hearts,  "This  is  the  way,  walk  ye  in  it."  Above 
the  earth-fogs  of  fleshly  desire  she  abides  in  her 
own  atmosphere  of  white  light.  Like  the  sweet 
cuddling  babe  at  the  mother's  breast,  love  is  guile- 
less and  clings  to  its  object  as  the  satisfied  child 
nestles  in  its  mother's  protecting  arms.  Love  be- 
lieveth  all  things  and  judgeth  justly  with  the  same 
sweet  trust  that  characterizes  the  just  estimate  pe- 
culiar to  the  little  child.  She  is  as  strong,  and 
careful,  and  far-seeing  as  the  protecting  devotion 
of  a  father,  and  as  watchful,  tender,  and  long- 
suffering  as  the  characteristic  sympathy  of  a  faith- 
ful mother.  Like  a  youth  she  knows  no  defeat, 
contemplates  none  but  noble  ideals,  and  rejoices 
in  the  abandon  peculiar  to  ideal  affection,  which 
because  of  its  purity  and  nobility  is  as  free  as  the 
soaring  bird.  Innocent  and  chaste,  she  is  as  con- 
stant and  enduring  as  are  the  first  vows  of  pure 
love  characteristic  of  the  June  days  of  maidenhood. 
Love  recognizes  neither  time,  space,  nor  outward 
separation.  She  multiplies  joys,  displaces  friction 
and  discord  with  harmony,  judges  not  by  appear- 


24  STUDIES    IN   CHARACTER. 

ances  but  judges  righteous  judgment,  tempers  zeal 

with  moderation,  and  tones  down  impatience  with 

longsuffering  and  intelligent  conservatism.      Love 

reveals  the  sage  in  the  child-mind,  and  uncovers 

the  childlike  in  the  mature.    Her  hands  lay  hold  of 

the  flaming  sword,  still  gleaming  in  the  hand  of 
the  angel  which  guards  the  gateway  to  Paradise, 

and  taking  by  the  hand  this  sentinel  of  the  Spirit, 

re-enters  with  her  the  Garden  of  Eden  advancing 

along  the  highway  of  the  Resurrection. 


II. 

Love  is  the  fulfilling  of  the  law. — Jesus. 

THE  centre  and  circumference,  the  corner-stone, 
foundation,  and  superstructure  of  all  being  is  love. 
Love  is  the  ultimate  of  existence ;  the  atmosphere 
of  Heaven;  the  principle  of  brotherhood;  the 
essence  of  real  character ;  the  basis  of  all  fellow- 
ship and  fraternity.  It  is  the  divine  Principle  of 
universal  creation ;  the  golden  cord  which  binds  all 


LOVE.  25 

society  together.  The  inspiration  of  love  displaces 
discord  with  peace.  It  begets  hope,  faith,  optim- 
ism, calm,  sober  judgment,  tenderness,  patience, 
compassion,  tolerance,  and  the  ministry  of  unself- 
ishness. The  touch  of  love  gives  grandeur  to  the 
common  things  of  life  and  unites  the  heart  of  man 
with  the  music  of  the  spheres.  Love  is  the  supreme 
end  of  all  progression ;  the  Promised  Land  of 
spiritual  affection ;  the  Eden  of  the  heart  and  the 
Paradise  of  earth's  famished  affections.  Love  is 
born  of  Spirit,  not  sense.  It  attaches  itself  to 
soul,  to  character,  and  to  the  divine  realism.  It  is 
not  based  upon  or  born  of  corporeality,  mere  per- 
sonal physique,  or  materialism.  The  revelation  of 
love  to  individual  consciousness  is  synonymous 
with  the  unfolding  of  the  divine  nature  within. 
Love  constitutes  the  correlated  elements  of  the 
divine  Father  and  Mother,  God.  In  it  is  to  be 
found  the  fulfilment  or  completion  of  all  law. 
Morality,  ideality,  and  spirituality  are  all  states 
and  stages  of  consciousness,  individually  and  sepa- 
rately approaching   the    noontide    glory  of    love. 


26  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

Love  is  more  than  a  mood.  It  is  a  state  of  being, 
yea  the  original  and  primitive  state  of  being  in  at- 
one-ment  with  God.  Love  includes  and  begets 
sympathy,  loving-kindness,  pity,  mercy,  and  pure 
affection.  Love  is  God's  nature  universally  and 
impartially  existent.  All  of  life's  paths,  roads,  and 
highways  lead  to  love.  Love  is  not  a  mere  senti- 
ment, nor  is  it  an  ecstatic  state  of  human  con- 
sciousness allied  to  passion  and  materialism.  Love 
appears  as  materialism  disappears.  Love  increases 
as  mere  personal  attachment  and  human  personal- 
ity decrease.  Love  manifests  itself  in  its  own  kind. 
Its  true  genius  is  in  reciprocity.  It  increases  only 
as  it  shares  itself  and  multiplieth  and  increaseth  in 
proportion  to  the  blessings  that  it  showers  upon 
the  race.  Love  is  no  inoperative,  stagnant,  and 
neutral  state  of  thought,  but  is  synonymous  with 
the  divine  enthusiasm,  believing  that  it  is  in  God 
and  God  is  in  it.  All  lovers  of  justice,  honesty, 
purity,  brotherhood  and  righteousness  are  lovers 
of  God.  The  love  element  in  life  is  the  God  ele- 
ment.   Without  it  life  is  cold,  crystalized,  and  void 


LOVE.  27 

of  poetry,  idealism,  and  true  humanitarianism. 
Love  is  a  ladder  reaching  from  earth  to  Heaven, 
from  sense  to  Soul,  and  from  humanity  to  divinity. 
Love  can  afford  to  be  patient,  longsuffering,  and 
hopeful,  because  it  is  the  beginning  and  end  of  all 
being  and  the  law  of  universal  attraction  to  the 
sons  of  men.  Love  is  in  itself  the  greatest  rebuke 
to  selfishness,  human  greed  and  cruelty.  Through 
the  purification  of  the  mind  the  bestial  or  animal 
dements  are  expunged  and  thought  naturally 
blends  with  Pure  Mind,  the  omniscient  Ruler  of  the 
universe.  This  purification  or  purgation  of  men- 
tality ushers  consciousness  into  the  inner  sanctuary 
of  being,  and  love  is  revealed ;  hence  progressively 
realized.  Love  bids  man  to  be  consistent  with  his 
fellows  independent  of  any  treatment  he  may  re- 
ceive from  them.  Love  brings  order  out  of  chaos 
and  harmony  out  of  discord.  Not  that  these  ele- 
ments of  error  can  change  their  characteristics,  but 
because  love  displaces  the  unreal  and  temporal 
with  the  real  and  establishes  the  government  of 
Good.    Love  takes  note  of  little  things.    Its  appre- 


28  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

ciation  is  based  on  quality  and  motive  rather 
than  quantity  and  degree.  Small  gifts  lovingly 
given  and  little  everyday  common  kindnesses 
please  love  most.  Love  looks  for  the  good  every- 
where and  under  all  conditions  and  finds  it.  It  so 
intensifies  the  normal  elements  of  mental  perspi- 
cuity that  it  is  expert  in  analyzing,  classifying,  dis- 
secting, and  diagnosing  thought.  Love  under- 
stands without  the  necessity  of  either  speech  or 
human  acquaintance.  Love's  observation  is  that 
of  the  sage,  old  and  wise  in  the  ways  of  God, 
while  at  the  same  time  perhaps  young  in  the  ways 
of  the  world.  Love  reveals  the  plan  of  the  uni- 
verse, the  nature  of  God,  and  the  character  of  man 
at  a  single  glance.  It  is  the  common  speech  of  all 
human  experience  and  can  be  called  the  universal 
language  of  character.  All  peoples,  races,  climes 
and  individuals  understand  it  without  the  necessity 
of  interpreter  or  translator,  in  proportion  to  their 
purity  of  heart  and  righteousness  of  character. 
Love  is  manhood's  crown  and  woman's  diadem. 
Love's  instincts  are  forgiveness,  unselfishness,  hu- 


LOVE.  29 

mility,  chastity,  moral  courage,  and  infinite  pro- 
gression. It  baptises  all  who  embrace  it  in  the 
pure  fountain  of  fellowship.  One  of  love's  strong- 
est charateristics  is  resident  in  the  power  of  exam- 
ple. A  character  consistently  and  symmetrically 
illuminated  by  love  possesses  a  glory  all  its  own, 
and  encourages  and  inspires  with  the  loftiest  aspi- 
rations known  to  the  human  heart  all  who  come 
into  perpetual  or  occasional  contact  with  it.  A 
life  lived  within  the  boundaries  of  the  land  of  love 
is  a  city  set  on  a  hill  which  cannot  be  hid.  Such 
a  character  readily  gains  access  to  the  hearts  of 
men  and  becomes  the  trusted  receptacle  of  their 
confidences,  heart  secrets,  and  heretofore  unspoken 
hopes.  Because  true  love  understands  individual 
relationship  and  is  impartial,  supersensual,  and 
poised,  it  knows  no  such  thing  as  jealousy,  envy, 
human  ambition,  or  avarice.  A  nature  breathing 
forth  love  in  kind  deeds  and  tender  words  knows 
no  such  thing  as  selfishness,  for  its  fragrance  is 
sent  forth  as  meekly  as  that  of  the  violet,  and,  like 
the  lily,  it  is  clothed  by  God. 


PURITY. 

Blessed  are  the  pure  in  heart  for  they  shall  see  God. — 
Jesus. 

THE  celestial  heights  of  individual  being  are 
forever  luminous  in  the  sunshine  of  a  pure  mind. 
Purity  is  the  summum  bonum  of  character.  Chas- 
tity of  mind  opens  the  doors  of  the  kingdom  of 
Heaven  to  the  thought  of  man.  The  purification 
of  mentality  through  the  baptisms  of  Spirit  cleanses 
the  atmosphere  of  consciousness,  enables  mind  to 
blend  with  the  harmony  of  the  universe  and  reveals 
the  grandeur  of  ideal  manhood  and  womanhood. 
Purity  is  Heaven's  law.  The  reign  of  righteous- 
ness, refinement,  culture,  guilelessness,  meekness, 
childlikeness,  trust,  faith,  unselfishness,  sincerity 
and  gentleness  are  all  the  direct  products  and 
component  parts  of  the  mind  that  is  pure.  When 
Jesus  said  "except  ye  be  converted,  and  become 

30 


PURITY.  31 

as  little  children,  ye  shall  not  enter  into  the  king- 
dom of  Heaven,"  it  is  noticeably  beautiful  to  real- 
ize that  he  set  up  as  the  standard  of  manly  and 
womanly  attainment  the  type  of  character  that  is 
invariably  manifested  by  not  merely  a  child,  but  a 
little  child. 

The  innocence  and  sweetness  of  the  mind  of 
the  little  child  is  not  the  manifestation  of  either 
ignorance  or  latent  human  mind.  Rather  is  it  a 
state  of  thought  and  living  which  lives,  moves, 
and  has  its  being  in  the  pure  atmosphere  of  Soul. 
It  accepts  the  provision  made  for  its  life  and  hap- 
piness by  its  parents  as  a  matter  of  course.  It 
lives  for  the  day.  Its  trust  is  exalting  to  behold. 
In  its  own  little  thought  the  universe  was  made  for 
it  and  it  for  the  universe.  It  hears  the  birds  sing 
and  recognizes  in  the  song  God's  direct  message. 
It  plays  in  the  sunshine  and  enjoys  the  fragrance 
of  the  flowers  as  one  consciously  having  dominion 
over  all  things.  It  is  meek  and  does  not  know  it ; 
unselfish  and  takes  no  account  of  it;  shares  its 
possessions   and    gifts   with    its    playmate  all    un- 


32  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

conscious  of  so-called  rights  of  personal  posses- 
sion. Instinctively  pure  and  chaste,  it  manifests 
no  false  sense  and  has  no  need  of  so-called  mod- 
esty. There  is  nothing  to  hide,  nothing  to  be 
ashamed  of.  If  naked  it  knows  it  not.  If  clothed 
it  claims  no  greater  purity  therefrom.  Eden's  at- 
mosphere is  congenial  to  this  little  life.  To  it 
there  is  no  sin,  no  human  duplicity,  no  rupture  of 
brotherhood,  no  false  sense  to  be  guarded  against, 
no  worrying  thought  for  the  provisions  of  the  flesh, 
no  doubts  for  the  unlived  to-morrow,  no  gloomy 
retrospection  and  no  morbid  introspection.  Life 
appears  to  it  as  one  everlasting  and  joyous  now, 
filled  with  the  affluence  and  lovingkindness  of  an 
everpresent  father.  The  child  heart  is  naturally 
sincere,  frank,  honest,  trusting  and  hopeful.  It 
enters  into  its  dominion  over  all  things  with  that 
divine  satisfaction  which  marks  the  possession  of 
conscious  kingly  origin.  Of  such  is  the  kingdom 
of  Heaven. 

How  blessed  it  is  to  remember  that  Jesus  said 
that  the  angel  faces  of  such  as  these  forever  behold 


PURITY.  33 

the  face  of  the  Father  in  Heaven.  These  angels 
are  the  thoughts  so  conspicuously  resident  in  the 
child  heart.  Thus  Jesus  turned  the  attention  of 
the  world  to  the  life  of  the  little  child.  Further- 
more, to  the  heart  of  the  child  life  is  not  only  real 
but  earnest.  The  element  of  pleasure  and  the 
exchange  of  gifts  and  enjoyments,  constitute  the 
chief  element  in  child  life,  and  in  this  we  have  one 
of  the  divine  prophecies  relating  to  the  heavenly 
kingdom,  —  "They  shall  be  abundantly  satisfied 
with  the  fatness  of  thy  house  ;  and  thou  shalt  make 
them  drink  of  the  river  of  thy  pleasures."  In  the 
common  belief  among  children  that  the  chief  end 
of  life  is  enjoyment  and  pleasure  abides  the  great- 
est truth  of  the  spiritual  world.  The  majesty  of 
the  divine  plan  is  based  upon  the  great  truth  that 
man,  male  and  female,  has  dominion  over  all 
things;  that  spiritual  bliss,  immortality,  pleasures, 
and  the  everlasting  enjoyment  of  infinite  Life  con- 
stitute the  only  legitimate  and  real  existence. 
True  progress  is  always  pleasureable  and  consists 
of  the  harmonious  unfolding  of  the  eternal  verities. 


34  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

In  this  progress  beauty,  sublimity,  perfection,  in- 
finite individuality  in  its  multitudinous  objects  of 
beauteous  creation,  the  everlasting  glory  of  the 
universe  and  the  dominion  of  the  sons  and  daugh- 
ters of  God,  constitute  the  very  essence  of  eternal 
life.  Herein  is  fulfilled  the  Scripture,  "We  all, 
with  open  face  beholding  as  in  a  mirror  the  glory 
of  the  Lord,  are  changed  into  the  same  image 
from  glory  to  glory."  As  the  angel  face  of  child- 
likeness  forever  beholds  the  face  of  the  Father  in 
Heaven,  receives  and  comprehends  on  an  ascend- 
ing scale  the  continuance  of  infinite  good  and  eter- 
nal love,  it  forever  advances  along  the  highways  of 
the  eternal  from  age  to  age,  even  unto  that  period 
when  time  is  no  more  and  the  infinitude  of  being 
is  entered  upon. 

One  of  the  most  beautiful  characteristics  of  a 
little  child  is  its  instinctive  disposition  to  nestle  in 
the  arms  of  its  mother.  Here  it  feels  safe  from  all 
danger,  secure  from  every  ill.  A  kiss  takes  away 
its  sense  of  pain.  A  look,  a  word,  a  nod,  a  pet 
name  restores  to  it  the  peace  of  the  universe,  and 


PURITY.  35 

then,  fresh  with  the  strength  gained  from  its  re- 
pose in  the  mother-arms,  it  again  takes  up  its  little 
tasks  and  goes  on  its  way  rejoicing.  If  out  of 
harmony  with  its  mother  it  feels  no  peace.  If  in 
harmony  it  knows  no  fear.  To  trust  and  not  be 
afraid  is  natural  to  it.  To  look  forward  rather  than 
backward  is  instinctive.  Therefore  when  Jesus  ex- 
alted above  everything  else  the  character  and  na- 
ture of  the  little  child  he  elevated  the  highest 
manifestation  of  the  divine  idea.  Thus  we  are 
brought  face  to  face  with  the  fact  that  youth  must 
advance  to  the  symmetry  and  maturity  of  mind 
represented  by  such  childlikeness.  Age  and  so- 
called  human  maturity  of  mind  must  come  back, 
or  better,  rise  toward  the  power  and  grandeur  of 
this  same  childlikeness.  In  it  there  is  nothing  that 
is  crude,  infantile,  or  weak ;  no  element  of  ignor- 
ance, fear,  or  superstition  abides  therein ;  no  craft- 
iness, plotting,  dishonesty,  passion  or  materialism  ; 
nothing  that  shocks  the  highest  instincts,  aspira- 
tions and  ideals.  When  wc  look  such  mind- 
elements  squarely  in  the   face  we  are  dazzled  by 


36  STUDIES    IN   CHARACTER. 

their  brightness,  but  at  the  same  time  we  see  that 
they  possess  the  naturalness  of  divinity  and  are 
therefore  normal,  and  hence  are  the  legitimate 
heritage  of  us  all. 

Sage  and  philosopher,  scientist  and  teacher, 
interpreter  and  scribe,  scholastic  and  king,  ruler 
and  wise  man,  in  one  united  company  shall  sit  at 
the  feet  of  that  type  of  mind  which  is  represented 
by  the  little  child  and  learn  the  mysteries  of  the 
kingdom  of  Heaven.  Then  shall  the  Holy  Spirit 
say  unto  them,  "Except  ye  become  as  little 
children,  ye  shall  not  enter  into  the  kingdom  of 
Heaven;  "  except  ye  enter  into  the  conscious  pos- 
session of  purity,  chastity,  and  guilelessness  ye  are 
forever  debarred  from  knowing  God's  eternal  plan 
of  life  and  the  true  nature  of  the  infinite  om- 
niscience. 

Oh,  men  and  women,  ye  who  look  from  the 
dazzling  heights  of  worldly  attainment,  sensual  ex- 
istence, and  materialism,  and  in  the  sober  and 
aspiring  moments  which  come  amid  the  excesses 
of  human   existence,  who  long  for  the  innocence 


PURITY.  37 

and  freedom  of  the  little  child,  know  that  this  cov- 
eted possession,  this  longed-for  pearl  of  great 
price,  is  within  your  reach.  Turn  from  sense  to 
Soul,  from  matter  to  Mind,  from  body  to  the  in- 
finite incorporeal  Spirit,  the  principle  of  all  that  is 
beautiful,  pure,  and  perfect,  and  therein  recognize 
the  infinite  possibilities  of  your  own  nature.  Pent 
up,  hidden  beneath  the  debris  of  mortal  and  human 
thought;  closed  in  by  your  walls  of  petty  jealousy, 
world-worship  and  false  pleasure,  lives  this  child- 
heart  waiting  and  longing  for  adoption.  Remem- 
ber that  the  greatest  friend  of  man,  who  offered 
himself  for  the  salvation  of  all  who  cultivated  false 
pleasures  and  material  excesses,  had  as  the  basis 
of  his  earth  mission  and  compassionate  ministry 
the  spirit  of  that  ancient  Hebrew  utterance, 
"Though  thy  sins  be  as  scarlet  they  shall  be  as 
white  as  snow."  The  beatitude,  "Blessed  are  the 
pure  in  heart  for  they  shall  see  God,"  begins  with 
a  benediction  and  ends  with  a  divine  declaration. 
The  pure  in  heart  are  blest  because  they  are  pure 
in    heart.       Purity,    chastity,    and    sinlessness    of 


38  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

thought  are  their  own  reward.  Ponder  the  deep 
significance  of  the  beatitude.  As  the  result  of  be- 
ing pure  in  heart,  mind,  or  consciousness,  as  the 
direct  outcome  of  childlikeness,  chastity,  loving- 
kindness,  and  honesty,  the  possessor  of  these 
graces  of  the  mind  shall  see,  recognize,  not  only 
apprehend  but  comprehend,  yea  enter  into  con- 
scious communion  with,  the  eternal  Father  and 
Mother,  God,  Creator  and  Sustainer  of  the  uni- 
verse. When  Isaiah  in  his  inspirational  picture  of 
the  Heavenly  estate  of  man  said, 

"  The  wolf  also  shall  dwell  with  the  lamb, 

And  the  leopard  shall  lie  down  with  the  kid; 

The  calf,  and  the  young  lion,  and  the  fatling  together," 

he  did  not  add,  and  a  king  shall  lead  them,  nor 
did  he  promise  the  rule  of  mightiness  or  egotistical 
selfhood,  but  said,  "And  a  little  child  shall  lead 
them."  So  in  life's  journey  from  sense  to  Soul, 
from  earth  to  Heaven,  in  the  resurrection  through 
which  every  earnest  heart  goes  daily,  the  progres- 
sive acquisition  of  purity  and  chastity  of  thought 
registers  the  ratio  of  scientific  progress  Godward. 


PURITY.  39 

Purity  of  thought  reveals  the  Eden  of  God's  divine 
plan.  It  releases  the  pent-up  and  restricted  men- 
tal faculties,  gives  vigor,  intellectuality,  courage, 
power,  spiritual  force,  manly  tenderness  and  chaste 
affection  to  manhood ;  to  womanhood  it  gives 
strength,  originality,  the  possession  of  divine  indi- 
viduality, hope,  mental  perspicuity,  and  in  a  con- 
spicuous degree  endows  her  with  the  spiritual 
essence  of  the  divine  nature.  Through  purity  and 
chastity  of  thought  the  male  and  female  of  God's 
creation  appear;  brotherhood  is  understood; 
friendship  is  sanctified  ;  right  friendship  revealed  ; 
the  eternal  glory  of  individual  love  understood, 
the  mystery  of  the  resurrection  state  is  solved,  and 
the  peace  which  passeth  understanding  makes 
luminous  with  beatific  presence  Christ's  beatitude, 
"Blessed  are  the  pure  in  heart  for  they  shall  see 
God." 


COMPASSION. 

"No  one  thing,"  wrote  Henry  Ward  Beecher, 
'does  human  life  need  more  than  a  kind  consid- 
eration of  men's  faults.  Every  one  sins;  every 
one  needs  forbearance.  Their  own  imperfections 
should  teach  men  to  be  merciful.  God  is  merciful 
because  He  is  perfect.  As  men  grow  toward  the 
divine  they  become  gentle,  forgiving,  compassion- 
ate. The  absence  of  a  merciful  spirit  is  evidence 
of  the  want  of  true  holiness.  A  soul  that  has 
really  entered  into  the  life  of  Christ  carries  in  itself 
a  store  of  enrichment  and  a  cordial  for  helpless 
souls  around  it."  Do  we  who  profess  to  bear  aloft 
the  Christ  standard  of  conduct  sufficiently  ponder 
the  heart-searching,  love-beggetting  nature  of  the 
religion  of  our  Master,  its  broad  humanity,  toler- 
ant forbearance,  temperate  procedure,  divine  com- 
passion,  merciful,   yet  exact   justice   and    philan- 

40 


COMPASSION.  41 

thropy?  It  truly  has  its  just  and  radical  interpre- 
tation, but  too  long  has  this  aspect  of  the  Gospels 
been  made  the  cardinal  and  only  interpretation  of 
the  simple  message  of  the  Nazarene.  Above  all 
else  it  should  be  remembered  that  Jesus  spoke 
from  the  depths  of  a  humanly  divine  heart.  Flesh 
of  our  flesh,  he  knew  by  the  eternal  law  of  sym- 
pathy what  was  in  the  heart  of  man,  both  good 
and  bad,  divine  and  human,  strong  and  weak.  He 
knew  the  temptations  of  the  human  mind,  for 
never  lived  there  a  heart  that  sympathized  more 
deeply  and  tenderly  with  sin-laden  humanity  than 
the  over-flowing  heart  of  the  Galilean  teacher. 
His  enemies  really  paid  him  the  grandest  tribute 
he  ever  received  when  they  scornfully  said,  "he 
was  the  friend  of  sinners."  Never  was  there  a 
character  more  above  worldlincss  and  impurity 
than  his.  Much  of  the  time  it  must  have  meant 
physical  and  mental  anguish  for  a  man  as  sensitive 
as  he  was,  to  be  so  constantly  at  work  among  the 
depraved,  the  sick,  and  the  sorrowing.  Surely  he 
was  "a  man  of  sorrows  and  acquainted  with  grief." 


42  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

He  was  divinely  heroic,  supremely  unselfish,  and 
tender  in  the  extreme.  He  always  looked  on  both 
sides  of  all  questions  in  which  motive,  and  the  sal- 
vation of  a  character,  were  involved.  Remember- 
ing his  parable  of  the  prodigal  son,  and  of  the  two 
debtors,  his  divinely  compassionate  treatment  of 
the  penitent  Magdalene,  his  words  to  the  adulter- 
ous woman,  and  lastly  his  declaration  that  the  har- 
lots would  enter  the  kingdom  of  Heaven  before  the 
self-righteous  Pharisees,  can  we  afford  to  do  less  in 
life  than  did  the  world's  most  scientific  and  suc- 
cessful reformer  and  religious  teacher?  In  no  one 
of  the  mentioned  parables  or  instances  did  Jesus 
ever  excuse  guilt,  or  even  suggest  that  the  penalty 
of  sin  could  be  removed  until  suffering  had  can- 
celled the  error.  He  based  all  his  declarations  of 
forgiveness  and  absolution  upon  the  sincere  peni- 
tence and  sorrow  for  wrong-doing  that  his  spiritual- 
ized and  compassionate  eye  detected  surging  to 
the  surface  of  the  sinner's  thought.  Or,  perchance 
he  perceived  its  first  faint  beams  shining  through 
the  dark  clouds  of  depravity  and  impurity,  as  one 


COMPASSION.  43 

sees  the  first  faint  lights  of  a  ship  as  it  nears  the 
home   harbor  after   months   of    tossing    upon   the 
stormy  waves  of  foreign  seas.     Did  he  close  his 
eyes  to  this  faint  struggling  ray?     Was  he  blind 
to  its  worth  because  its  material  and  evil  surround- 
ings in  the  still  evil  character  almost  hid  its  real 
nature  and  value?     Did  he  pass  it  by  to  look  for 
greater    evidence    of    reformation    in    some    other 
character?    No.     He  first  valued  it,  then  he  gently 
nurtured  it  and  tenderly  cultivated  it  as  the  florist 
does  a  specially  delicate  and  tender  plant ;  he  pro- 
tected  it  as  the   little  seedling  of  virtue,   purity, 
manhood,  womanhood, — yea,  divinity;    he  care- 
fully and  patiently  removed  from  about  its  gradual 
growth  the  hard,  coarse  soil  of  error  that  mentally 
surrounded  it,  and  by  the  life-giving  rays  of  divine 
Love  reflected  by  him,  it  steadily  grew  into  larger 
and   nobler   character,   till   at  last  the  sorrow  for 
wrong-doing,  and  the  first  faint  love  for  the  good 
and  pure,  bloomed  into  the  celestial  beauty  of  a 
Christ-like  life.     Jesus  let  the  past  bury  its  dead. 
Never  did   he  taunt  the   honest  penitent,  the  re- 


44  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

formed  prodigal  or  Magdalene  with  even  a  hint  or 
suggestion  of  the  days  that  were  past,  or  the  error 
that  had  been  seen  and  honestly  repented  of 
through  pangs  unspeakable.  Let  us  frankly  ex- 
amine our  hearts,  our  methods,  ways,  and  means, 
and  honestly  ask  ourselves  if  we  follow  his  exam- 
ple, and  let  the  dead  past  of  error  bury  its  dead 
when  genuine  reformation  has  followed  repentance. 
Do  we  blot  out  the  dark  past  of  the  erring  careers 
of  our  friends  and  enemies,  and  know  and  love 
them  with  heartfelt  love  and  trust  as  they  tread 
the  safe  and  upward  pathway  of  true  living? 
After  a  friend  apologizes  for  wrong-doing  should  a 
man  still  force  upon  him  stern  condemnation? 
Should  he  enumerate  all  his  neighbor's  faults  to 
him  every  time  some  one  of  them  happens  to  force 
him  to  put  into  practice  just  a  small  portion  of  the 
teaching  of  Jesus,  "Love  your  enemies,  bless  them 
that  curse  you?"  Do  not  men  often  let  the  one 
cardinal  fault  or  weak  point  of  an  otherwise  noble 
and  well-developed  character,  blind  them  to  the 
ninety  and   nine   noble  and   beautiful   traits?      In 


COMPASSION.  45 

short,  are  we  not  theoretically  followers  of  Jesus  in 
these  true  methods  of  dealing  with  our  fellows,  and 
practically  doers  of  things  that  contradict  alike  the 
spirit  of  Christ,  and  the  religion  of  love?  Religion 
is  one.  It  is  simply  spiritual  goodness.  It  is  love 
lived.  It  is  that  which  interprets  the  deep  things 
of  the  Spirit  to  the  men  and  the  women  of  this 
world,  whose  Gethsemane  and  Calvary  experiences 
have  so  purified  and  inspired  their  hearts  that  they 
no  longer  estimate  bliss,  health,  and  joy  from  a 
material  basis,  but  from  the  foundation  of  spiritual- 
ity. The  religion  of  Love  asks  of  each  disciple 
spiritual  consistency.  Do  we  live  the  Golden 
Rule?  Do  we  sincerely  love  those  whom  we  know 
do  not  love  us?  Do  we  not  often  love  in  the  ratio 
that  we  find  we  are  loved,  and  in  many  instances 
wait  to  find  that  we  are  first  loved  before  we  even 
allow  ourselves  to  recognize  the  worth  of  a  charac- 
ter or  heart  that  so  far  has  made  known  no  affec- 
tion for  us?  This  is,  of  course,  searching  self- 
questioning,  but  unless  the  motive-springs  of  being 
are   right,   the  whole  mechanism  of  character  is 


46  STUDIES   IN    CHARACTER. 

perpetually  out  of  order,  and  we  lack  the  ability  to 
retain  friends  and  lose  enemies  by  loving  them. 
Love  reflecting  the  divine  principle  of  being  is  the 
essence  of  the  allied  graces — compassion,  toler- 
ance, and  patience.  These  three  constitute  a  holy 
alliance,  and  are  indispensable  to  a  consistent  and 
Christian  character.  A  narrow-minded  person  is 
invariably  intolerant,  cruel,  abstractly  just  rather 
than  lovingly  and  mercifully  exact.  Intelligent 
and  spiritual  loyalty  to  God  —  Good,  as  Princi- 
ple,—  always  includes  and  involves  loyalty  to  all 
true  representatives  of  the  truth  on  earth.  Blind, 
unthinking,  and  miscalled  loyalty  to  personality, 
or  human  opinion,  creates  disloyalty  to  both  God 
and  His  idea  —  man.  If  thought  is  governed  by 
God  it  follows  scientifically  that  loyalty  to  every 
honest  and  spiritual  individual  becomes  an  inevit- 
able sequence.  And  to  that  individual  man  or 
woman  who  reflects  in  the  greatest  degree  the 
Christ  image,  will  be  given  the  supreme  loyalty, 
because  such  love  begets  a  discipleship  that  knows 
neither  limit  of   time    nor  of    numbers,   and  that 


COMPASSION.  47 

neither  earth  nor  hell  can  discourage  or  destroy. 
In  love  to  and  for  God  is  included  love  for  our 
fcllowmen,  bond  and  free,  Gentile  and  believer, 
great  and  humble,  rich  and  poor.  Love  evolves 
patience,  forbearance,  tolerance,  pity,  mercy,  com- 
passion, and  radicalism  in  metaphysical  ideas  of 
life;  it  develops  judgment  that  is  righteous  rather 
than  judgment  by  appearances,  lofty  hope,  faith 
and  optimism,  deep  and  strong  faith  in  the  power 
of  divine  Love  and  Good  to  reach  even  the  low- 
est of  earth's  creatures,  spiritual  serenity,  calm 
strength,  tenderness  and  selflessness. 

"Judge  not  hastily  of  others 
But  thine  own  salvation  mind; 
Nor  be  lynx-eyed  to  thy  brother's, 
To  thine  own  offences  blind; 
God  alone  discerns  thine  own 
And  the  hearts  of  all  mankind." 

Of  earth's  weary  ones  the  Spirit  asketh,  Does  your 
heart  yearn  for  the  Life  divine?  Does  it  cry  for  a 
deeper  insight  into  the  mysteries  of  being?  Does 
human  life  promise  vastly  more  than  it  gives? 
Have    shattered    hopes  and   wounded    aspirations 


48  STUDIES    IN    CHARACTER. 

formed  clouds  of  despair  that  have  hidden  from 
view  the  fondest  hopes  of  earthly  existence?  Has 
bodily  disease  discouraged  you  in  your  efforts  to 
evolve  the  ideal  life?  Have  struggle,  poverty, 
gloom,  depression,  the  loss  of  loved  ones  and  the 
coldness  and  indifference  of  the  world  hardened 
your  nature?  Through  the  discipline  of  life  has 
the  heart  been  softened  by  its  chastisements,  or 
made  weary  by  the  experiences  that  you  have 
been  wrongly  taught  were  God-sent?  Has  the 
great  law  of  spiritual  cause  and  effect  been  learned 
and  understood,  and  have  you  found  the  great 
truth  that  suffering  is  either  self-inflicted,  or  comes 
through  ignorant  disobedience  of  the  eternal  laws 
of  Good?  If  you  wish  to  be  whole,  and  thus  to 
heal  the  wounds  so  common  to  the  heart  of 
humanity,  there  is  but  one  panacea,  one  curative 
element  and  healing  balm  —  "the  mind  of  the 
Master," 

Alas  for  him  who  never  sees 
The  stars  shine  through  his  cypress  trees! 
Who,  hopeless,  lays  his  dead  away, 
Nor  looks  to  see  the  breaking  day 


COMPASSION.  49 


Across  the  mournful  marbles  play; 
Who  hath  not  learned  in  hours  of  faith, 
The  truth,  to  flesh  and  sense  unknown, 
That  Life  is  ever  Lord  of  death 
And  love  can  never  lose  its  own. 


THE  LESSON  OF  SUFFERING. 

TEXT:     Weeping  may  endure  for  a  night,  but  joy  cometh 
in  the  morning. — Psalms  30:5. 
For  whosoever  shall  keep  the  whole  law,  and  yet 
offend  in  one  point,  he  is  guilty  of  all. 

— James  2:10. 

The  lessons  taught  by  earth-shadows,  sorrows, 
and  losses  are  blessings  in  disguise.  The  heart- 
breakings  of  human  existence  are  but  the  birth- 
throes  of  the  life  divine.  Like  discordant  notes 
that  break  the  harmony  of  music,  earthly  troubles 
are  the  jarring  discords  that  little  by  little,  or  per- 
chance abruptly,  turn  us  to  the  eternal  law  of  God, 
whose  love  leads  and  guides  all  careers  from  sense 
to  Soul,  from  sorrow  to  joy,  and  to  that  peace 
which  the  world  can  neither  give  nor  take  away. 

Human  suffering,  strictly  speaking,  is  not  a 
part  of  the  divine  plan,  yet  if  its  lessons  are  rightly 
learned   it  shows  man   the  wisdom   and   safety  of 

50 


THE    LESSON    OF    SUFFERING.  5  I 

conforming  to  the  eternal  law  of  Spirit  and  right- 
eousness. 

In  the  midst  of  human  prosperity,  bodily 
health,  and  social  enjoyment,  most  people  give 
little  thought  to  the  deep  things  of  the  Spirit. 
Sailing  with  tide  and  wind  both  favorable,  we  find 
it  hard  to  picture  the  hardships  that  come  when 
tide  and  wind  are  both  against  us.  Rude  is  the 
awakening  that  mortals  experience  when  the 
dream  of  listless  existence  is  broken.  Sharp  are 
the  thorns  that  stir  to  waking  the  sleepers  in  the 
world  of  materialism  and  selfishness. 

Suffering  of  mind  and  body  are  like  fog-signals 
along  the  sea-coast,  that  warn  men  of  danger  and 
reveal  the  presence  of  the  hidden  reef  and  rocky 
shore.  They  are  alarms  that  tell  us  that  we  are 
either  wilfully  or  unknowingly  disobeying  the  law 
of  life,  or  are  ignorantly  saying  amen  to  certain 
false  beliefs  of  the  human  mind,  by  believing  that 
suffering  is  divinely  ordained. 

Sorrow,  like  pain,  makes  us  love  and  appreciate 
peace,  joy,   and    happiness  in    an    enlarged  way. 


52  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

But  if  the  lesson  of  continued  earthly  discord  fails 
to  set  our  thoughts  to  work  in  new  or  higher  ways, 
we  have  not  yet  learned  its  deep  lesson.  Earthly 
woe  is  often  perpetuated  because  it  is  erroneously 
believed  that  God  afflicts  His  creatures  for  some 
good  and  wise  purpose. 

Departure  from  the  laws  of  musical  harmony 
ushers  the  student  at  once  into  the  realm  of  dis- 
cord, which  to  an  ear  attuned  to  the  beauty  of 
harmony,  creates  positive  and  continued  suffering. 
Departure  from  the  scientific  lines  of  procedure  in 
mathematics  leads  the  scholar  at  once  into  the 
world  of  error  and  mistakes.  In  both  instances 
the  only  deliverance  from  the  discords  found 
through  the  departures,  is  for  the  student  and 
scholar  to  leave  the  realm  of  wrong  and  error,  and 
come  into  conformity  with,  and  abide  by,  the  law 
of  harmony  and  mathematics.  Would  it  be  ra- 
tional or  scientific  to  assert  that  the  principle  of 
these  two  sciences  causes,  or  is  responsible  for,  the 
discord  experienced  because  of  departure  from  its 
guidance? 


THE    LESSON    OF    SUFFERING.  53 

So  it  is  with  earth's  dark  places  and  life's 
troubles.  All  are  but  the  workings  of  the  false 
notes  and  errors  of  the  human  mind,  which  little 
by  little  and  step  by  step  set  us  to  asking  where 
and  what  is  truth?  Be  it  remembered  that  God 
"doth  not  afflict  willingly,  nor  grieve  the  children 
of  men." 

Sorrow  is  disciplinary  in  the  fullest  sense ;  so  is 
a  continuation  of  discords  on  the  piano  and  a 
series  of  errors  in  a  bookkeeper's  trial  balance. 
Popular  misuse  greatly  abuses  the  words,  "God's 
will"  and  "law,"  and  makes  them  cover  not  only 
a  multitude  of  sins,  but  a  million  mistakes  that 
directly  inflict  their  own  penalty  under  the  un- 
changing laws  of  cause  and  effect. 

Wrong  acts  are  but  the  product  of  wrong 
thoughts,  and  unless  evil  thinking  gradually  gives 
place  to  right  thinking,  man  will  not  live  in  har- 
mony with  the  divine  will,  nor  cease  to  look  upon 
self-inflicted  suffering  as  God-sent.  Ignorance  of 
the  fact  that  we  are  not  in  accord  with  the  laws  of 
divine  Mind,  or  good  motives  while  there  is  wrong 


54  STUDIES    IN   CHARACTER. 

living,  by  no  means  spare  us  the  mental  or  bodily 
torment  and  pain  that  comes  from  broken  laws  nor 
relieve  us  from  the  self-evolved  suffering  of  the 
latent  human  thought. 

Thus  it  is  that  children  and  oftentimes  the  best 
people  that  we  know  suffer  most.  "Whosoever 
shall  keep  the  whole  law  and  yet  offend  in  one 
point,  he  is  guilty  of  all,"  i.e.,  he  who  performs  a 
difficult  problem  correctly  and  blunders  at  the  last, 
makes  a  failure,  so  far  as  the  correct  answer  is  con- 
cerned. So  it  is  in  life,  if  we  are  more  alive  to  the 
higher  life  than  our  neighbor,  and  yet  have  not 
passed  the  line  where  we  learn  that  suffering  exists 
because  of  our  ignorance  of  the  divine  law  of  life, 
we  shall  probably  surfer  more  keenly  than  the 
lover  of  sin,  for  we  are  more  sensitive  to  wrong, 
and  our  despair  adds  to  our  cup. 

There  is  one  phase  of  human  misery  that  de- 
serves marked  exception  to  this  general  idea  of  the 
causes  and  lessons  of  trouble,  namely,  the  suffering 
of  the  just  for  the  unjust,  all  the  sorrows  that 
seem  forced  into  human  lives  through  no  fault  or 


THE    LESSON    OF    SUFFERING.  55 

choice  of  their  own.  He  who  lived  as  never  other 
man  lived,  the  founder  of  the  highest  system  of 
ethics  that  the  world  has  ever  known,  suffered 
most  from  the  sins  of  others.  He  gave  his  bene- 
diction to  this  "Gospel  of  suffering,"  saying: 
.  "Blessed  are  ye,  when  men  shall  revile  you,  and 
persecute  you,  and  shall  say  all  manner  of  evil 
against  you  falsely,  for  my  sake.  Rejoice,  and  be 
exceeding  glad :  for  great  is  your  reward  in 
Heaven :  for  so  persecuted  they  the  prophets 
which  were  before  you." 

Like  the  rose  that  when  trampled  upon  emits 
the  sweetest  perfume,  so  doth  the  heart  most  dis- 
appointed and  torn,  shed  abroad  upon  humanity 
the  life-giving  fragrance  of  trust,  patience,  philan- 
thropy, and  compassionate  love.  They  who  suffer 
most  love  most,  and  they  who  have  most  to  bear 
from  the  shortcomings  of  their  fellows  soonest  see 
that  even  the  gold  of  human  character  affords  not 
the  fulness  of  spiritual  peace.  Thus  they  turn  at 
length  to  divine  Love  "in  whom  we  live,  and 
move,  and  have  our  being."    Then  peace  descends, 


56  STUDIES    IN   CHARACTER. 

the  silver  of  life's  cloud  is  seen,  the  glory  of  God's 
sunlight  bursts  through  the  gray  clouds  of  grief, 
and  we  thank  the  Eternal  for  the  rod  and  the 
chastening,  for  it  was  the  Angel  in  disguise  to  lift 
us  heavenward. 

O  ye  who  suffer  wrong 
Fear  not  and  be  ye  strong, 
For  the  furnace  of  affliction, 
And  the  anguish  of  contrition 
Are  flames  of  cleansing  purity, 
And  friends  to  Heaven's  art. 

It  is  the  inspiration  and  strength  gained  in 
life's  Gethsemanes  that  enables  us  to  ascend  our 
Calvary  and  bear  our  cross.  It  is  under  the 
shadows  of  this  cross  that  we  gain  the  power  to 
say,  "Father,  forgive  them,  for  they  know  not 
what  they  do."  Again,  it  is  the  courage  and 
Christly  resignation  born  of  crucifixion  in  company 
with  and  by  the  side  of  wrong-doers,  that  makes 
men  able  to  see  that  at  length  the  purified  and 
reformed  will  enter  Paradise  with  the  godly.  This 
is  the  grandeur  of  Love's  plan  of  universal  salva- 


THE    LESSON    OF    SUFFERING.  57 

tion.  So  take  fresh  courage,  ye  whose  sky  is 
leaden,  whose  path  is  thorny. 

Let  not  sorrow  harden  the  heart  nor  quench 
love's  power  in  your  life,  but  let  it  show  the 
nothingness  of  existence  apart  from  God's  own 
plan,  and  let  it  be  the  highway  to  the  City  of  thy 
God.  Let  no  earthly  ill  bring  forth  in  your  heart 
doubt  of  God  as  compassionate  Love,  for  He  never 
sends  trouble,  but  is  man's  only  salvation  from  sin, 
suffering,  sickness,  and  death.  "Whom  the  Lord 
loveth  he  chasteneth,  and  scourgeth  every  son 
whom  he  receiveth."  The  eternal  law  that  sin  or 
ignorance  brings  suffering  is  the  divine  chastening 
that  proves  God's  love  for  His  creation,  for  what 
would  otherwise  turn  us  from  wrong  to  God  ?  And 
this  scourging  must  needs  come  ere  we  are  suffi- 
ciently purified  to  be  received  of  the  one  God. 

When  selfishness,  passion,  hate,  jealousy,  and 
materialism  cease  to  be  a  part  of  temporal  man's 
mental  moods,  then  shall  he  begin  to  rise  out  of 
the  realm  of  earthly  suffering,  and  coming  into 
oneness  with  divine  Mind  he  shall  reflect  the  har- 


58  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

mony,  joy,  and  immortality  of  life  "hid  with  Christ 
in  God."     Then  can  he  sing, — 

"  I  hold  it  truth,  with  him  who  sings 
To  one  clear  harp  in  divers  tones, 
That  men  may  rise  on  stepping-stones 

Of  their  dead  selves  to  higher  things." 

Has  your  life  been  fraught  with  continued 
struggle?  Despair  not;  for  out  of  it  will  come  the 
gold  of  strong  character  and  trust  in  God.  Has 
sorrow  and  loss  of  dear  ones  strewn  your  life-path 
with  thorns,  and  kept  the  altar-fire  of  your  love 
alive  with  the  flame  of  heart-pangs?  Fear  not,  the 
"everlasting  arms"  are  around  and  beneath  you. 
Love  will  still  every  longing,  give  you  your  own 
once  more,  and  reveal  their  undying  spiritual 
identity.  Then  as  the  mists  of  matter  disperse 
will  you  see  the  celestial  peaks  of  the  mountains  of 
God,  and  the  City  of  Life,  not  by  or  through  the 
death  of  the  body,  but  by  the  spiritual  understand- 
ing of  eternal  life. 


FRIENDSHIP. 

11  I  call  you  no  longer  servants  but  friends,  for  the  servant 
knoweth  not  what  his  Lord  doeth." — Jesus. 

HARMONIOUS  relationship  is  synonymous  with 
scientific  being.  For  ages  religionists,  philoso- 
phers, scientists,  and  idealists  have  labored  to 
ascertain  the  real  and  ultimate  relationship  be- 
tween individuals  under  the  law  of  God.  In  large 
degree  the  solution  of  this  great  problem  has  re- 
mained like  a  sphinx  of  the  desert,  —  silent,  unin- 
terpreted, mystical.  Life  under  all  conditions  is 
progressive.  Progress  involves  new  views,  and  the 
enlargement  and  expansion  of  all  true  relationship. 
As  personality,  the  temperamental  characteristics 
of  the  person,  is  outgrown  through  the  operation 
of  unfolding  individuality,  man  comes  consciously 
into  scientific  relationship  with  both  God  and  his 
fellows.      The  divine  Mind  including  within  itself 

59 


60  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

all  gender,  but  still  remaining  one,  is  the  universal 
Ego  of  universal  man  —  male  and  female.  There- 
fore as  individuals  through  mental  processes  of 
spiritual  evolution  come  understandingly  into 
union  with  the  divine  Nature,  they  also  enter  into 
scientific  relationship  with  one  another.  This  is 
the  divine  grandeur  of  the  deific  plan,  that  the 
revelation  of  God  includes  the  revelation  of  man  in 
his  true  character  and  perfection.  As  divine  Mind 
is  infinite  so  the  universal  expression  of  this  Mind 
in  the  universe  and  man  is  infinite.  Hence  infinite 
Individuality  as  Cause  is  expressed  through  infinite 
individualities  as  effect.  Recognizing  this  law  of 
being  Jesus  said,  "  He  that  hath  seen  me  hath  seen 
the  Father."  "I  and  my  Father  are  one."  The 
oneness  of  God  includes  the  essential  oneness  of 
man  under  the  law  of  brotherhood,  fellowship,  and 
individual  relationship.  The  sweetness,  poetry, 
and  idealism  of  life  proceed  from  symmetrical  rela- 
tionship understandingly  discerned  through  spirit- 
ual law.  In  the  eternal  scheme  of  creation  there 
is  no  monotony,  no  dull  repetition.    Each  moment, 


FRIENDSHIP.  6l 

hour,  day,  and  epoch  is  new  to  itself.  Each  suc- 
cessive mountain  top  of  vision  exceeds  in  beauty 
and  grandeur  the  last.  Infinite  life  involves  infinite 
progression.  Infinite  progression  signifies  the 
eternal  unfolding  of  infinite  phenomena,  and  the 
spiritual  capacity  of  man  to  reveal  the  image  and 
likeness  of  God  in  conscious  possession  of  domin- 
ion over  all  things.  The  eternal  Omniscience  pre- 
cludes the  possibility  of  a  crude,  incomplete,  or 
imperfect  creation.  In  all  periods  of  the  world's 
history  certain  impersonal  ideals  have  been  held 
as  synonyms  of  Deity.  It  can  be  truly  said  that 
the  sum  total  of  the  highest  thoughts  of  the  ages 
represents  the  universal  idea  of  the  divine  charac- 
ter. The  ruling  conception  of  God  and  His  laws 
governs  the  character  of  every  period  of  human 
history.  The  erroneous  belief  that  men  can  come 
into  right  relationship  with  God  while  ignoring  the 
privileges  and  duties  of  scientific  relationship  with 
their  fellows,  the  ideas  of  God  is  being  rapidly  rel- 
egated to  the  realm  of  designated  error.  The 
greatest  friend  to  the  best  interests  of  the  human 


62  STUDIES   IN    CHARACTER. 

race  sanctified  friendship  when  he  said  to  his 
students  and  followers :  "  I  call  you  no  longer 
servants  but  friends,  for  the  servant  knoweth  not 
what  his  Lord  doeth."  He  addressed  them  thus 
toward  the  close  of  his  life's  ministry,  at  a  time 
when  he  was  nearer  to  them  and  they  to  him  than 
ever  before.  When  they  received  from  him  this 
blessed  appellation  they  had  entered  deeply  into 
his  life,  and  his  spirit  largely  possessed  theirs. 
Therefore  Jesus  crowned  this  relationship  with 
jewels  rare,  among  which  confidence,  trust,  con- 
stancy, ministry,  unselfishness,  purity,  honesty> 
protection,  and  meekness  shine  conspicuously. 

True  friendship  is  a  sanctified  state.  Its  gates 
cannot  be  stormed  nor  its  walls  scaled.  It  is  an 
impregnable  fortress  to  all  who  enter  its  hallowed 
domains,  yet  a  luminous  highway  leads  to  its  por- 
tals, and  "a  wayfaring  man  though  a  fool  need  not 
err  therein."  Within  its  precincts  nothing  can 
abide  that  worketh  abomination  or  maketh  a  lie. 
It  is  as  lofty  as  the  heavens.  It  has  the  silent 
dignity  of  the  everlasting  hills ;  the  protection  of 


FRIENDSHIP.  63 

life's  holy  of  holies;  the  luminous  light  of  the  city 
that  lieth  four  square ;  the  glory  and  purity  of  the 
real  Eden.  Real  friendship  is  a  condition  invisible 
to  personal  sense  testimony.  The  selfish  mind 
knows  it  not  and  materialism  stands  with  face 
turned  from  it.  Friendship  should  be  common 
but  never  commonplace.  Its  genuineness  is  based 
upon  spiritual  discernment  and  worth.  Its  four 
square  walls  and  gates  of  pearl  are  based  on 
foundations  of  reciprocity,  unselfish  love  and 
purity. 

A  man's  acquaintances  are  not  necessarily  his 
friends.  Friendship  is  essentially  dignified.  Inas- 
much as  it  is  the  mutual  recognition  of  the  traits 
which  constitute  true  character  it  is  capable  of 
divine  expansion  and  progressive  unfoldment. 
Honesty  is  the  basis  of  friendship.  Purity,  unself- 
ishness, and  ministering  love  form  its  superstruc- 
ture, and  spiritual  communion  the  keystone  of  its 
arch  of  promise.  A  true  friend  is  not  only  a  min- 
istering angel,  but  an  individual  to  be  ministered 
unto.       The    essence    of    friendship    is    the    inter- 


64  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

change  of  common  hopes,  ideals,  and  spiritual 
longings.  Its  real  selfhood  is  to  be  found  in  co- 
operation. The  infinitude  of  individuality  pre- 
cludes the  possibility  of  monotonous  friendship,  for 
the  eternal  plan  of  progression  makes  character 
fresh  and  interesting  each  succeeding  day.  As  the 
varied  blendings  of  sound  express  the  infinite  pos- 
sibilities of  musical  harmony,  so  one's  friends  play 
their  parts  in  the  divine  drama  of  life  and  make  up 
the  music  of  one's  life. 

There  is  a  passion  that  is  in  no  wise  related  to 
materialism  or  physical  corporeality,  nor  is  it  an 
earth  sense.  It  is  the  divine  passion  of  sinless 
humanhood  which  mounts  as  on  wings  of  eagles 
and  in  its  ascending  flight  permeates  the  entire 
nature  with  holy  zeal,  spiritual  affection,  and  lov- 
ingkindness.  It  has  a  passionate  love  for  all  that 
is  good  and  pure  and  beautiful.  To  it  the  rarest 
creations  of  Eden  are  those  lives  which  manifest 
the  glory  of  the  divine  plan.  This  spiritual  sense 
thinks  of  thoughts  rather  than  things ;  cultivates 
ideals  rather  than  persons,  and  glories  in  individ- 


FRIENDSHIP.  65 

uality  as  opposed  to  the  limitations  of  the  human 
mind.  The  soul,  or  spiritual  sense  recognizes  its 
own.  One  phase  of  friendship  is  the  result  of  long 
mutual  acquaintance,  exchange  of  ideas,  and  allied 
experiences.  Another  phase  of  friendship,  and 
perhaps  the  one  that  most  conspicuously  bears  the 
imprint  of  divine  destiny  is  that  friendship  that  we 
recognize  as  established  after  an  individual  has 
come  into  our  lives  or  environment,  when  in  per- 
haps the  first  frank  conversation  it  is  understood 
that  all  unknown  to  ourselves,  life  and  its  experi- 
ences have  been  fitting  both  natures  for  that  hour 
of  friendship's  nativity. 

As  personality  is  lost  and  individuality  is  there- 
by found,  characters  not  only  rise  upward  and 
Godward,  but  gravitate  toward  such  other  natures 
as  are  living  on  the  same  plane.  As  in  chemistry 
similar  elements  blend,  and  uniting  make  one,  so 
in  the  resurrection  periods  of  human  consciousness 
friends  are  found,  enemies  lost,  and  the  sweet  har- 
monies of  being  are  won.  How  often  in  some 
great  crisis  of  life,  when  the  heart  is  bowed  and 


66  STUDIES   IN  CHARACTER. 

burdened  with  its  grief,  perchance  taking  no  one 
into  its  confidence  through  a  sense  of  duty,  loyalty, 
or  isolation,  but  communing  alone  with  God  as  its 
only  consoler,  and    healer,   there    comes  into  the 
heart's  inner  courts  a  friend.     This  friend  comes 
without  the  formality  of  an  introduction.    Humanly 
a  stranger,  divinely  a  helper.      He  perceives  the 
struggle ;   he  has  passed  through  it  all  before.     A 
glance,  a  word,  a  tender  act  tears  aside  the  thin 
veil  of  non-acquaintance,  and  the  sublime  dignity 
of  chaste  friendship  is  recognized  by  the  sufferer 
and  the  angel  visitant  alike.     Herein  exists  one  of 
the  sweetest  evidences  of  the  protecting  care  of  the 
eternal  Love.     Verily  in  such  a  case  is  the  Scrip- 
ture fulfilled,  "He  will  give  His  angels  charge  con- 
cerning thee  .  .  .  lest  thou  dash  thy  foot  against  a 
stone."      Into  such  experiences,  and   behind  the 
scenes  of    human  life  they  are   legion,  no  vulgar 
familiarity  can    enter,    nor    is  there    any  element 
within    out  of  which  contempt   can    be    evolved. 
They  are  from  the  beginning  transcendental,  pure, 
divine,  reciprocal.     They  represent  the  operation 


FRIENDSHIP.  6y 

of  that  law  of  brotherhood,  mutual  ministry  and 
protection,  which  engirdles  the  entire  plan  of  ex- 
istence, as  the  rainbow  arches  the  heavens.  In  the 
hour  of  darkness  it  illumines.  In  the  time  of  lone- 
liness it  comforts.  When  the  soul  seems  most 
alone  it  reveals  the  mediatorial  office  of  man  or  of 
woman.  When  the  tomb  of  agony,  disappoint- 
ment, and  cruelty  seems  to  claim  its  victim,  and 
against  the  door  is  rolled  the  great  stone  of  human 
indifference  and  selfishness,  it  is  the  lightning  flash 
of  divine  love  which  saith  to  the  heart,  "I  will 
never  leave  thee  nor  forsake  thee,  for  behold  at 
the  crucial  hour  there  shall  appear  knocking  at  the 
door  of  thy  life  a  friend." 

God  is  universal,  impartial  Love.  As  men  and 
women  rise  into  the  conscious  possession  of  their 
spirituality  they  reflect  the  elements  of  the  divine 
Mind.  Therefore  friendship  recognizing  as  it  must 
individuality,  impartiality,  and  supersensual  exist- 
ence, must  show  forth  the  beatific  presence  of 
universal  Love.  Friendship  is  a  thing  of  character. 
Its   essential   elements  include  the   divine   graces. 


68  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

Emerson  has  said  that  a  friend  is  one  in  whose 
presence  we  can  think  aloud.  A  friend  who  under- 
stands makes  no  merely  personal  demands,  be- 
cause he  knows  that  he  has  from  his  friend  trust, 
confidence,  love. 

The  take-it-for-granted  spirit,  i.e.,  human  im- 
position or  selfishness,  is  a  misnomer  in  true  friend- 
ship, for  its  reciprocal  character  precludes  the  pos- 
sibility of  selfishness.  A  friend  is  not  something 
to  be  owned  and  used,  but  is  one  through  whom 
the  Eternal  speaks ;  one  whose  example  is  potent 
in  our  lives;  one  in  whom  the  divine  image  and 
likeness  of  God  is  made  manifest.  Friendship  is  a 
God-ordained  estate,  not  an  institution,  nor  the 
product  of  mere  personal  attachment.  Personality 
has  virtually  no  place  in  its  domain.  Friendship 
is  the  result  of  certain  operative  divine  laws  of 
mental  congeniality  and  spiritual  similarity.  In 
reality  we  cannot  personally  select  friends.  If  we 
are  yielding  our  minds  and  lives  to  the  activities  of 
divine  Principle,  our  friends  are  neither  self-elected, 
self-appointed,  nor  personally  chosen,  but  come  to 


FRIENDSHIP.  69 

us  through  the  direct  operation  of  the  divine  law 
of  spiritual  community  and  association,  yea  through 
the  order  of  the  Spirit's  law  of  like's  attraction  of 
like. 

The  rights  of  friendship  are  impregnable  and 
cannot  be  tampered  with.  As  no  one  has  a  right 
to  interfere  with  the  individual's  relationship  with 
God,  so  the  privileges  and  symmetry  of  friendship 
should  be  protected  from  human  interference,  jeal- 
ousy and  envy.  Our  friends  tell  us  of  the  universe. 
They  are  God's  mouth-pieces.  We  should  be 
familiar  with  them  only  as  ideas  of  the  eternal 
Mind.  Friendship  should  be  a  divine  compact 
entered  upon  for  the  elevation  of  the  race.  Self- 
aggrandizement,  personal  pleasure,  and  selfish 
possession  should  be  rigidly  excluded  from  its 
portals.  God's  universal  law  of  individuality  and 
impartiality  precludes  the  possibility  of  confound- 
ing true  friendship  with  the  materialistic  law  of 
so-called  affinity,  which  would  try  to  reverse  the 
divine  order,  and  dignify  selfish  exclusiveness  with 
the  name  of  friendship.     Friends  should  approach 


yo  STUDIES   IN    CHARACTER. 

each  other  mutually  conscious  of  the  divine  dignity 
of  true  manhood  and  womanhood.  Friends  never 
gossip.  A  friend  will  tenderly  listen  to  the  recital 
of  another's  sorrows,  fears,  and  struggles,  not  be- 
cause of  a  desire  to  concede  to  the  selfish  assump- 
tion that  a  friend  is  one  into  whose  ears  we  are 
always  privileged  to  pour  our  woes,  but  because 
the  human  heart  receives  comfort  and  strength 
from  talking  out  its  human  misgivings  and 
troubles.  Then  it  is  that  a  friend  can  carry  out 
the  divine  motive  of  friendship,  and  comfort,  en- 
courage, and  renew  the  hope  of  the  one  who  has 
given  him  his  confidence.  While  the  greatest 
freedom  should  exist  between  friends,  and  both 
representatives  should  lovingly  minister  and  be 
ministered  unto,  yet  we  have  no  right  to  assume 
that  friends  are  given  us  that  they  may  act  as  re- 
ceptacles for  all  our  woes.  There  are  certain 
struggles  and  burdens  that  God  will  carry  us 
through  and  lift  us  above  if  we  go  to  Him.  There- 
fore it  is  often  wisest  and  best  to  go  to  the  moun- 
taintop  of  spiritual  communion   and   thereby  rise 


FRIENDSHIP.  71 

above  the  mists,  rather  than  first  to  go  to  the  friend 
and  burden  him,  and  to  God  afterwards.  There 
should  exist  a  delicacy  of  intercourse  which 
naturally  must  act  as  a  safeguard  against  over- 
burdening those  who  give  us  most  love  and 
loyalty. 


PERSONALITY,  IMPERSONALITY, 
INDIVIDUALITY. 

PERSONALITY,  the  Latin  word  persona,  says 
Momerie,  meant  primarily  a  mask.  It  is  derived 
from  per,  through,  and  sonare,  to  sound.  In 
ancient  times  the  actors  wore  masks  and  these 
masks  were  called  persona,  because  the  words 
sounded  or  were  uttered  through  them.  Then 
secondarily  the  term  persona  came  to  mean  by  a 
natural  transition  of  ideas  the  character  which  any 
one  assumed,  the  part  which  he  played  either  on 
or  off  the  stage.  The  persona  of  an  actor  are  the 
characters  of  his  repertoire ;  the  persona  of  Mr. 
Irving  were,  for  example,  Charles  I.,  Louis  XL, 
Shylock,  the  Vicar  of  Wakefield,  etc. 

Personality  should  be  distinguished  from  indi- 
viduality.     Individuality,  alias   real   character,   or 

the  divine   nature,   appears   as   personality  disap- 

72 


PERSONALITY.  73 

pears.  Personality  represents  the  sum  total  of 
human  or  mortal  mind  characteristics.  It  is  at  all 
times  a  mask  hiding  the  real  character  of  the  in- 
dividual. The  temperament,  moods,  mental  char- 
acteristics, disposition,  and  dominating  tendencies 
of  a  nature,  constitute  the  personality,  which  mani- 
fests itself  in  countless  ways.  No  two  personalities 
are  wholly  alike,  yet  what  can  be  correctly  termed 
the  general  personality  of  human  nature,  or  mate- 
rial mentality,  is  made  up  of  certain  essential 
elements.  The  aggregate  or  sum  total  of  these 
mental  elements,  wholly  transitory  and  temporal  in 
nature,  constitute  the  dominating  characteristics  of 
the  races  of  mankind  and  mark  its  periods  of 
progress  or  retrogression.  Person  and  personality 
are  essentially  one,  yet  the  word  person  is  more 
capable  of  spiritual  significance  than  personality. 
The  vital  elements  of  the  human  or  mortal  mind 
such  as  selfishness,  anger,  hate,  jealousy,  pride, 
sensuality,  dishonesty  and  fear  are  the  centre  and 
circumference  of  personality,  and  a  person  is  one 
who    manifests    in    greater    or    less    degree    these 


74  STUDIES    IN   CHARACTER. 

mental  elements.  These  component  parts  of  per- 
sonality can  be  subdivided  as  follows:  subtlety, 
deceit,  craftiness,  duplicity,  human  policy,  envy, 
malice,  appetite,  passion,  self-will,  egotism,  self- 
love,  self-righteousness,  revenge,  retaliation,  self- 
justification,  hypocricy,  indifference,  haughtiness, 
pride,  cowardice,  bigotry,  worldly  wisdom,  scho- 
lasticism, superstition,  mental  domination,  love  of 
leadership,  ambition  and  human  diplomacy.  The 
constant  action  of  these  thoughts  and  character- 
istics is  the  cause  of  the  friction  of  human  exist- 
ence. Every  crime  in  the  category  of  sin  has  for 
its  motive-power  one  or  more  of  the  elements  of 
human  personality.  Human  existence  governed 
by  these  traits  of  personality  is  synonymous  with 
chaos.  The  wear  and  tear  of  physical  existence  is 
caused  by  the  constant  play  one  upon  another 
of  these  inharmonious  elements.  Some  aspects  of 
personality  represent  what  may  be  termed  natural 
temperamental  conditions  and  human  idiosyncra- 
cies.  It  is  easier  to  be  patient  with  these  disagree- 
able phases  of  life  than  with  certain  other  condi- 


PERSONALITY.  75 

tions  which  are  sell-evidently  traits  that  have  been 
acquired  or  indulged  in  order  that  certain  selfish 
and  illegitimate  ends  might  be  secured.  Personal- 
ity is  a  term  that  includes  latent  and  dormant 
mental  characteristics,  as  well  as  those  that  arc 
recognized  as  the  visible  motive-springs  of  persons. 
Personality  expresses  itself  in  three  general  ways. 
First,  as  the  natural  characteristics  of  a  person, 
born  of  inheritance,  religious  training,  environ- 
ment and  natural  mental  bias.  Second,  as  the 
result  of  a  repeated  surrender  to  temptations  and 
depraved  instincts  which  leads  to  an  exaggeration 
of  certain  elementary  errors,  which  through  the 
law  of  accretion  after  a  while  become  crystallized 
habits,  methods,  and  actions  in  error.  Third,  as 
visible  manifestations  of  a  deadened  sense  of  moral 
right  and  spiritual  distinction  in  which  the  person 
constantly  manifests  errors  of  thought,  speech,  and 
action,  which  reveal  a  condition  of  what  may  be 
called  mental  petrifaction  of  thought.  In  this  last 
state  of  mentality  the  person  is  his  own  greatest 
enemy,  and  seems  sensitive  only  to  the  pain  and 


?6  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

suffering  that  accrues  to  himself  from  the  mental 
condition  which  has  been  created  by  a  continued 
surrender  to  personal  erring  instinct.  For  others 
he  has  no  care.  Personality  is  really  but  another 
name  for  the  mind  of  the  flesh,  materialism,  crude- 
ness  of  character,  carnality,  the  bestial  element 
expressing  itself  through  all  strata  of  phenomenal 
existence.  St.  Augustine  called  the  devil  the  ape 
of  God.  Personality  can  be  well  termed  the  ape 
of  divine  individuality.  Its  worship  of  lords  many 
and  gods  many  is  but  a  subtle  effort  to  disguise  its 
real  intention,  namely,  the  deification  of  its  own 
selfhood  and  the  worship  thereof.  Personality  is 
at  all  times  enshrouded  in  mystery  and  mist,  for 
like  the  realm  of  discord  as  opposed  to  that  of 
harmony  in  music,  it  is  a  kingdom  of  self-destruc- 
tion, lawless,  temporary,  and  inharmonious.  It  is 
personality  and  persons  that  are  tiresome.  Men 
never  weary  of  nobility  of  character.  He  who  loves 
Good  as  Principle  loves  it  wherever  it  is  manifested 
and  through  whomsoever  it  is  expressed.  The 
jangling  heart-breaking  discords  of  human  exist- 


PERSONALITY.  77 

ence  come  directly  from  the  human  mind's  vain 
efforts  to  harmonize  personality  with  individuality. 
If  what  is  known  as  a  self-created  man  allows  his 
success  to  crystallize  into  vainglory  and  pride  of 
personal  attainment  he  then  becomes  a  worshipper 
of  his  own  personality.  He  believes  that  through 
his  own  efforts  unaided  by  any  divine  Principle 
outside  of  himself  he  has  evolved  his  position, 
power,  wealth,  and  influence.  If  this  type  of  man 
gleans  from  his  well-earned  success  the  grand  les- 
son of  humility,  he  finds  his  individual  dependence 
upon  the  creative  Principle  of  life.  The  heart  of 
such  a  man  goes  out  in  gratitude  to  the  eternal 
law  of  progress  and  its  Sustainer,  in  heartfelt 
prayer  and  thoughtfulness.  Personality  always 
makes  the  mistake  of  the  first-named  type  of  man. 
It  never  reaches  beyond  the  boundaries  of  its  own 
self-aggrandizement.  It  will  move  forward,  if  need 
be,  over  the  dead  bodies  of  friend  and  foe  alike  in 
order  to  achieve  its  own  coveted  results.  It  poses 
as  a  martyr  while  in  the  very  act  of  carrying  on 
hypocritical  operations.      It  assumes  the   role  of 


78  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

the  saint  while  using  religion  as  a  cloak  to  hide  its 
infamous  actions.  Its  love  of  leadership  exceeds 
its  thirst  for  possession.  In  its  attempt  to  gain 
dominion  over  men  it  loses  dominion  over  every- 
thing else,  including  itself.  Personality  loves  the 
throne  of  the  dictator  and  finds  its  deepest  satisfac- 
tion in  its  vain  attempt  to  usurp  the  throne  of  the 
Governor  of  the  universe.  The  human  mind  is  not 
only  self-destructive  but  naturally  stupid.  Self- 
ignorance  is  its  normal  condition.  Sad  it  is  that 
casual  observers  and  unthinking  critics  confound 
personality  with  individuality.  While  personal 
habits,  traits,  dress,  speech  should  really  be  truth- 
ful expressions  of  individual  character,  they  often 
tend  to  obscure  the  real  individual.  Thus  to  the 
extent  that  critics  stop  at  these  things  and  judge 
individuals  by  them  they  not  only  pass  wrong 
judgment  and  come  to  false  conclusions,  but  per- 
chance deprive  themselves  of  the  privilege  of 
knowing  rich  and  noble  natures.  It  is  to  be  re- 
gretted that  in  the  popular  confusion  relating  to 
the  true  status  of  personality,  private  and  spoken 


PERSONALITY.  79 

judgment  of  people  is  ofttimes  based  on  the  ob- 
servation of  mere  personality,  which  misrepresents 
rather  than  represents.  There  are  many  grada- 
tions of  error.  The  lower  forms  of  personality  are 
the  most  obnoxious,  for  like  the  most  depraved 
forms  of  sin  the  partially  enlightened  mind  in- 
stinctively turns  from  them.  As  individual  char- 
acter appears  steadily  subjugating,  displacing,  and 
annihilating  personality,  the  traits  and  mental 
make-up  of  the  person  goes  through  a  process  of 
purification.  Thus  personality  gradually  fades  out, 
and  in  its  processes  of  extinction  manifests  less  and 
less  that  is  distasteful  and  hateful.  If  it  is  appar- 
ent that  a  person  is  honestly  cultivating  the  divine 
characteristics,  the  world  as  a  whole  is  patient  with 
his  shortcomings  and  personal  traits,  and  is  mani- 
festly optimistic  as  to  the  ultimate  attainment  of 
manly  or  womanly  character. 

Impersonality  is  the  highway  to  divine  individ- 
uality. An  impersonal  character  is  one  who  wor- 
ships Principle  rather  than  personality.  Imperson- 
ality is  the  rising  of  the  eternal  day,  that  dawns  on 


80  STUDIES    IN    CHARACTER. 

human  consciousness  above  the  horizon  of  human 
limitation  in  the  ratio  that  personality  is  outgrown. 
The  perpetual  examination  of  and  surrender  to  the 
characteristics  of  human  personality  tend  to  ob- 
scure spiritual  vision,  limit  individual  growth,  and 
prolong  the  tragedy  of  human  dualism.  Imper- 
sonality rises  in  the  strength  of  divinity  toward  the 
realm  of  Omniscience,  and  reveals  the  grandeur  of 
infinite  individuality  expressed  in  the  universe  and 
man.  Impersonality  is  in  one  sense  but  another 
name  for  liberality  and  scientific  government.  An 
impersonal  character  is  one  that  cultivates  rela- 
tionships individual  rather  than  exclusive.  Imper- 
sonality elevates  no  claim  of  personal  ownership. 
It  is  jealous  of  individual  rights  and  privileges  and 
accords  to  all  absolute  freedom.  Impersonality  is 
synonymous  with  mental  breadth  and  unrestricted 
vision.  It  is  the  natural  enemy  of  provincialism, 
bigotry  and  narrowness,  and  pursues  to  its  destruc- 
tion every  form  of  personality.  Impersonality  does 
not  mean  isolation  or  loneness.  In  its  radiation  of 
individual,    impartial    love,    and    righteousness,   it 


PERSONALITY.  8 1 

supplants  personal  and  selfish  claims  with  the 
rights  of  individuality.  Under  the  law  of  imper- 
sonality every  individual  moves  in  his  own  orbit  in 
scientific  relationship  with  every  other  idea.  Im- 
personality must  be,  and  is  the  only  consistent 
method  through  which  the  divine  impersonality 
can  be  demonstrated  in  the  destruction  of  sin,  in 
the  healing  of  disease,  and  in  the  revelation  of  the 
image  and  likeness  of  God  in  man  and  woman. 
Impersonality  thinks  of  races  rather  than  persons ; 
nations  instead  of  townships,  universal  salvation 
rather  than  the  predestination  of  the  elect  minority, 
and  sees  in  the  religion  of  Jesus  a  universal  pan- 
acea for  the  ills  of  mankind.  The  human  mind  is 
often  fearful  lest  in  graduating  from  the  humanly 
captivating  characteristics  of  personality  it  will  lose 
all  that  is  dear  and  essential  to  its  happiness.  In 
the  processes  of  graduation  through  which  human 
consciousness  goes  in  its  journey  from  personality 
to  individuality  there  are  certain  wilderness  experi- 
ences and  periods  of  loneness,  yea  of  mental 
anguish.      These   symptoms   mark   the   advancing 


82  STUDIES    IN   CHARACTER. 

stages  of  scientific  mental  growth.  These  mind 
and  mood  experiences  fraught  with  misgivings, 
doubt,  fear,  discord,  confusion  and  timidity,  are 
nothing  more  nor  less  than  the  disintegrating  pro- 
cesses of  growth.  During  these  states  of  con- 
sciousness we  are  called  upon  to  walk  by  faith  and 
not  by  sight.  All  transitional  periods  of  life  are 
accompanied  with  these  conditions.  The  cause  of 
it  is  self-evidently  simple. 

Individuality  in  man  is  the  manifestation  of 
the  infinite  individuality  that  we  know  as  God. 
Through  the  infinite  diversity  in  creation  is  ex- 
pressed the  infinite  creative  Principle  —  God.  As 
personality  is  the  sum  total  of  the  person's  human 
characteristics,  so  individuality  is  the  sum  total  of 
the  individual's  divine  characteristics.  The  ele- 
ments that  make  up  individuality  are  positive. 
Those  that  form  a  personality  are  negative.  Per- 
sonality is  temporal  and  transitory.  Individuality 
is  permanent  and  infinite  in  its  progressive  unfold- 
ing inasmuch  as  it  represents  an  individualization 
of  infinite  Mind.     Mental  proximity  to  the  nature 


PERSONALITY.  83 

of  divine  Mind  of  necessity  includes  the  expression 
of  the  divine  attributes  in  the  individual.  The 
nearer  a  mind  approaches  the  similitude  of  the 
universal  Ego  the  more  such  a  consciousness  par- 
takes of  the  primary  elements  of  God.  In  this  fact 
lies  the  significance  of  Jesus'  utterance,  "Before 
Abraham  was,  I  am."  Here  the  founder  of 
Christianity  made  public  recognition  of  his  eternal 
individuality  which  antedated  the  personal  Jesus. 
Thus  he  recognized  his  egoistic  selfhood  as  above 
his  personal  human  existence.  In  the  ratio  that 
the  divine  plan  of  atonement  between  man  and 
God  is  worked  out  in  divine  Science  man  enters 
into  the  possession  of  his  eternal  and  harmonious 
individuality.  Individuality  is  that  symmetrical 
whole  in  character  which  constitutes  the  image  and 
likeness  of  God.  The  building  of  character  is 
really  the  unfolding  or  discovery  of  divine  individ- 
uality. Individuality  and  character  are  really  one. 
Personality  shuts  out  the  mysteries  of  the  kingdom 
of  Heaven,  obstructs  the  processes  of  natural  good, 
alienates  man  from  the  good  and  pure,  and  like  a 


84  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

mist  hides  from  view  the  divine  vistas  of  individual 
being.  As  the  earth-damps  and  valley-fogs  of  the 
human  mind  are  dissipated  by  the  Sun  of  Right- 
eousness, the  glorious  heights  and  possibilities  of 
individuality  appear.  Individuality  is  essentially 
united  with  divine  Principle.  When  rightly  under- 
stood it  makes  the  presence  of  human  jealousy  an 
impossibility,  for  it  reveals  the  impersonal  law  of 
relationship  in  which  every  individual  occupies  his 
or  her  place  in  the  divine  economy  without  the 
privilege  of  either  usurpation  or  loss  of  rights.  It 
is  impossible  for  an  honest  mind  to  adhere  to  Prin- 
ciple and  at  the  same  time  be  loyal  to  the  freaks, 
idiosyncrasies,  and  arbitrary  changes  of  personal- 
ity, alias  the  human  mind,  as  manifested  in  the 
average  person.  Loyalty  to  the  individual  is 
synonymous  with  loyalty  to  the  fixed  Principle  of 
the  universe  and  all  its  attributes.  The  individual 
manifesting  in  his  character  the  characteristics  of 
divinity  is  nothing  more  nor  less  than  an  individ- 
ualization   of    God    visible    to    his    fellow-beings. 


PERSONALITY.  85 

Hence  the  utterance  of  Jesus,  "He  that  hath  seen 
me  hath  seen  the  Father."  He  who  sees  such 
positive  graces  of  character  as  purity,  honesty, 
spiritual  and  moral  courage,  lovingkindness,  un- 
selfishness and  impartial  love,  sees  the  divine  char- 
acter itself,  and  enters  into  an  understanding  of  the 
Scriptural  utterance,  "  He  that  loveth  not  his 
brother  whom  he  hath  seen,  how  can  he  love  God 
whom  he  hath  not  seen?"  All  character  is  in- 
cluded in  individuality.  The  ideal  aspects  of 
individuality  inspire  thought  to  soar  toward  the 
divine  heights.  Individuality  is  new  every  day. 
Personality  becomes  more  tiresome  every  hour. 
As  personality  decreases  individuality  increases. 
Within  the  realm  of  individuality  is  to  be  found 
man's  great  possibilities,  his  capacity  for  not  only 
infinite  progress  and  unfolding,  but  also  the  un- 
limited measure  of  his  capacity  for  spiritual  pleas- 
ure. The  symmetry  of  individuality  is  unique. 
As  every  single  object  in  universal  creation  is  com- 
plete in  itself,  so  the  highest  manifestations  of  the 


86  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

infinite  individuality  called  man  and  woman  repre- 
sent the  divine  grandeur  of  the  eternal  God.    True 
individuality    is    poised,    rounded,    and    expresses 
that    elegance    and    spiritual    completeness    that 
marks  all  that  is  of  deific  origin.     Sometimes  we 
designate  individuality  as  richness  of  character  or 
nature.     Under  other  circumstances  we  speak  of  a 
man  whose  word  is  as  good  as  his  bond.     Such  an 
appellation  signifies  true  individuality  in  character. 
While   individuality  includes   the  all   of   character 
and  is  composed  of  many  elements,  yet  the  deli- 
cacy and   perfection  of  the  divine   creation  is  so 
unique  that  an  individual  may  run  the  whole  scale 
of  the  divine  characteristics,  and  at  different  times 
represent  a  consistent  embodiment  of  the  various 
virtues.      Such  evidences  of  the  divine  infinitude 
fascinate    the    mind    spiritual    enough    to    behold 
them,  and  prove  practically  to  thought  the  meta- 
physics of  the  eternity  upon  whose  threshold  man 
now  stands.     He  who  is  manifesting  individuality 
on    an    ascending    scale    is    new    every    day ;    his 


PERSONALITY.  87 

character  is  resplendent  and  luminous  in  the  light 
of  divinity.  Individuality  has  a  fragrance  and 
beauty  all  its  own  which  is  intuitively  and  in- 
stinctively recognized  by  the  same  resident  ele- 
ments in  all  who  observe  it. 


TO  UNDERSTAND  AND  TO  BE 
UNDERSTOOD. 

I. 

To  UNDERSTAND  another  is  one  of  Heaven's 
richest  blessings,  and  to  be  understood  by  another 
is  perhaps  love's  sweetest  and  most  satisfying  gift. 
The  interchange  of  common  tastes,  hopes,  and 
aspirations,  through  the  medium  of  human 
language  is  at  once  tender,  uplifting,  and  en- 
nobling. But  far  above  the  language  of  the  human 
tongue  abides  the  unspoken  intercourse  of  hearts 
that  understand  each  other,  without  the  necessity  of 
speech.  Similar  experiences  in  life's  problem  evolve 
unity  in  vision,  aspiration,  and  nature.  Kindred 
natures  are  made  so  by  Red  Sea  passages  and 
fiery  purifications.  Unity  and  understanding  come 
also  from  the  natural  innocence  and  guilelessness 

of  the  child  heart,  ever  tracing  its  course  through 

88 


TO  UNDERSTAND  AND  TO  BE  UNDERSTOOD.  89 

the  clear  ether  of  pure  thought,  and  under  all 
circumstances  resisting  the  impure  and  depraved. 
Such  a  nature  clings  with  the  tenacity  of  chastity 
and  youthful  sincerity  to  the  bulwarks  of  right- 
eousness, "mounts  up  with  wings  as  eagles,"  and 
on  an  ascending  scale  unites  itself  with  all  that  is 
ideal  in  manhood  and  womanhood.  To  under- 
stand ;  what  a  world  of  meaning  exists  in  these 
two  words  !  To  understand  ;  to  stand  under,  as  it 
were,  and  through  clear-eyed  vision  observe  and 
appreciate,  yea,  correctly  comprehend,  that  which 
bases  every  action,  motive,  and  word  of  those 
whom  we  call  friends  and  companions.  This  is  a 
privilege  for  which  we  must  pay.  This  gift  fresh 
from  the  hand  of  God  cannot  be  purchased  by 
coins  in  human  use  which  have  for  their  standard 
the  fluctuating  valuations  of  fictitious  character  and 
unprincipled  action,  motive,  and  speech.  To 
understand  another  —  a  proposition  as  simple  as  it 
is  grand,  and  as  inspiring  as  it  is  simple.  It  repre- 
sents the  very  goal  of  mental  and  spiritual  achieve- 
ment.    It  involves  pure  intuition,  spiritual  disco:,!- 


90  STUDIES    IN   CHARACTER. 

ment,  perspicuity,  patience,  impartiality,  justice, 
lovingkindness,  affection.  Above  all  it  calls  for 
that  understanding  of  that  Golden  Rule  for  life 
which  makes  it  easy  for  one  to  occupy  the  place 
of  another  when  either  passing  judgment  or  rightly 
estimating  character.  To  understand  another 
means  infinitely  more  than  to  come  to  certain 
definite  conclusions  as  to  the  significance  of  an- 
other's actions,  general  attitude,  and  detail  of 
career  or  speech.  It  includes  the  mental  act  of 
coming  into  harmonious  relationship  with  the 
dominating  mental  characteristics  of  the  individual. 
It  means  a  knowledge  of  those  essentially  divine 
characteristics  which  as  a  whole  make  the  true 
character  of  the  individual  or  individuals  whom  we 
are  privileged  to  understand.  There  is  a  certain 
sacred  and  sanctified  privilege  that  goes  with  the 
act  of  understanding  another.  This  privilege  is 
summed  up  in  the  word  ministry.  Ministry  in- 
volves affection,  unselfishness,  helpfulness,  patience, 
protection,  and  sympathetic  love.  Those  whom 
we  understand  soon  know  it.     The  heart  that  feels 


TO  UNDERSTAND  AND  TO  BE  UNDERSTOOD.     91 

itself  understood  by  us  instinctively  opens  the  door 
of  its  exclusive  retirement  and  shares  with  the 
nature  that  it  perceives  has  an  understanding  of  its 
own,  its  hopes  and  confidences,  ideals  and  aspira- 
tions. And  above  all  else,  yet  with  a  conserv- 
atism and  dignified  reticence  that  almost  ap- 
proaches silence  and  mystery,  its  long  hidden 
sorrows  and  unseen  crosses  which  have  perchance 
for  years  been  carried  silently,  prayerfully,  with  the 
divine  grandeur  of  lofty  heroism,  are  laid  at  the 
feet  of  that  sympathetic  understanding  which  wears 
the  insignia  of  honest  and  true  friendship.  The 
privilege  of  understanding  another  is  great.  But 
greater  is  the  responsibility  that  accompanies  it. 
Because  of  it  we  are  called  upon  to  protect  the 
friend,  shield  the  sister,  or  love  and  patiently  care 
for  the  child.  When  we  understand  another  heart 
and  nature  the  mother  and  the  father  though  ad- 
vanced in  years  receive  from  us  the  tender 
solicitude  of  an  understanding  heart,  the  tender 
gratitude  and  perpetual  kindnesses  that  go  to 
make  up  the  mountain  heights  of  human  happi- 


92  STUDIES    IN   CHARACTER. 

ness.  In  understanding  the  hidden  springs  of 
character  the  true  law  of  brotherhood  is  unfolded 
and  the  interests  of  one  are  seen  to  be  the  essential 
interests  of  all.  With  understanding  comes  the 
responsibility  of  being  our  brother's  helper  and 
keeper.  The  critic  must  be  lost  in  the  patient 
helper,  the  opposer  and  obstructionist  in  the  friend, 
the  fault-finder  in  the  loving  inspirer,  and  the 
selfish  and  indifferent  person  must  be  lost  in  the 
nobility  of  solicitous  affection  and  ministering  love. 
How  often  in  life  we  find  a  heart,  a  tender  and 
smypathetic  nature,  a  character  radiant  with  the 
graces  of  constancy,  fidelity,  unselfishness,  purity, 
womanly  nobility,  or  manly  courage,  yearning,  yea 
hungering  and  thirsting  to  have  some  honest  heart 
and  true  nature  thoroughly  understand  it;  not  de- 
manding sympathy  in  a  merely  personal  way  with 
the  remaining  human  traits  and  idiosyncracies,  but 
yearning  to  have  the  real  life-aims,  motives,  and 
unrecognized  works  sympatethically  understood. 
When  this  prayed-for  event  takes  place  the  heart 
long  shut  in  with  its  own  burden  and  pent-up  sus- 


TO  UNDERSTAND  AND  TO  BE  UNDERSTOOD.  93 

pense,  breathes  the  atmosphere  of  spiritual  unity 
and  sympathy,  and  a  sigh  of  relief,  yea  a  long 
drawn  breath  of  quiet  satisfaction  prefaces  the 
coming  of  that  peace  which  "passeth  human 
understanding."  Here  perchance  a  few  words,  a 
look,  a  thought  expressed  but  in  suggestive 
phrase,  has  thrown  wide  open  the  door  of  sympa- 
thetic understanding.  Life  seems  no  longer  a 
state  of  eternal  isolation.  Another  heart  of  kin- 
dred nature  allied  to  our  own  by  the  ties  of  a  com- 
mon Heavenly  parentage,  united  to  ours  through 
life-experiences  akin  to  our  own,  imparts  to  us  the 
certain  and  sacred  message,  "understand  that  thou 
needst  not  linger  by  the  tomb  of  thine  own  loneli- 
ness." Glorious  is  the  ministry  of  understanding 
others.  Majestic  is  the  outcome  of  rightly  utiliz- 
ing this  privilege.  Careers  may  be  changed,  hearts 
gladdened,  lives  exalted,  characters  ennobled, 
minds  purified,  problems  simplified,  experiences 
spared,  lives  sweetened,  and  the  ministry  of  love 
and  purity  appreciated  by  the  righteous  use  of  this 
God-given  privilege.     Its  cost  is  great.     It  comes 


94  STUDIES   IN    CHARACTER. 

not  simply  through  acquaintance  with  the  elements 
that  constitute  the  human  mind  and  character.  It 
comes  rather  from  a  spiritual  and  intimate  com- 
munion with  the  characteristic  elements  of  the 
divine  Mind.  We  can  only  understand  the  divine 
attributes  visible  in  the  character  of  noble  men  and 
women  about  us  by  first  spiritually  understanding 
the  nature  of  these  elements  as  they  exist  resident 
in  the  Principle  of  all  character, —  God.  Hence 
the  two  great  commandments  repeated  and  exalted 
by  Christ  Jesus,  "Thou  shalt  love  the  Lord  thy 
God  with  all  thy  heart,  and  with  all  thy  soul  and 
with  all  thy  mind  and  with  all  thy  strength." 
This  is  the  first  and  great  commandment.  The 
second  is  like  unto  it,  "Thou  shalt  love  thy  neigh- 
bor (friend)  as  thyself."  It  has  been  truly  said 
that  there  is  no  such  thing  as  human  history.  In 
a  floating  iceberg  only  one-tenth  of  its  gigantic 
form  is  visible  above  the  water,  while  nine-tenths 
exists  beneath  the  surface.  So  it  is  with  the  lives 
of  those  about  us.  What  we  see,  know  of,  and  as 
a  rule  come  in  contact  with  in  most  cases  repre- 


TO  UNDERSTAND  AND  TO  BE  UNDERSTOOD.  95 

sents  perhaps  one-tenth  of  the  real  elements  con- 
stituting character.  The  remaining  nine-tenths, 
which  really  constitute  the  individual,  remain  hid- 
den and  the  actual  character  is  an  enigma  to  all 
except  the  heart  that  enters  into  the  inner  pre- 
cincts and  holy  of  holies,  through  the  gateway  of 
sympathetic  understanding. 


II. 

AGAIN  let  it  be  repeated,  To  understand  an- 
other is  one  of  Heaven's  richest  blessings,  and  to 
be  understood  by  another  is  perhaps  Love's  sweet- 
est and  most  satisfying  gift. 

If  it  is  a  privilege  to  understand  another  what 
shall  we  say  of  the  divine  satisfaction  of  being 
understood.  God's  plan  is  one  of  reciprocity. 
We  receive  as  we  give,  and  approach  true  life  and 
blend  with  the  eternal  plan  of  the  universe  only  as 
we  minister  unto  others.  Life's  school  of  experi- 
ence teaches  us  how  to  understand  and  sympathize 


96  STUDIES    IN    CHARACTER. 

with  the  experiences  of  our  fellows.  Sympathy  is 
the  soul's  silent  music,  an  angel's  song  without 
words,  the  inaudible  rhythm  of  affection,  the  silent 
ministry  of  tenderness,  the  fragrance  of  Eden's 
flowers,  the  angelic  law  of  brotherhood  and  the 
infinite  calm  of  spiritual  communion.  To  be 
understood,  to  be  sympathized  with,  loved,  pro- 
tected, helped,  encouraged,  correctly  classified, 
weighed  and  estimated,  to  be  understood,  to  be 
justly  dealt  with,  individually  and  impartially 
served,  to  have  one's  faults  as  kindly  pointed  out 
as  one's  strong  points  and  lovable  characteristics 
are  approved  and  praised,  this  constitutes  the  sub- 
limity of  intelligent  friendship,  true  helpfulness, 
and  affectionate  relationship.  In  the  Heavenly 
order  of  relationship  there  is  but  one  law,  one 
plan,  destiny  and  goal,  namely,  the  establishment 
of  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven,  the  reign  of  harmony 
and  righteousness  wherein  all  are  brothers  and 
sisters,  children  of  a  common  Parent  under  the 
law  of  love;  for  what  said  Jesus,  "Who  is  my 
mother?  and  who  are  my  brethren?     Whosoever 


TO  UNDERSTAND  AND  TO  BE  UNDERSTOOD.     97 

shall  do  the  will  of  my  Father  which  is  in  heaven, 
the  same  is  my  brother,  and  sister,  and  mother." 
The  love  of  parent  for  child  and  child  for  parent, 
the  affection  existing  between  the  brother  and  the 
sister  and  the  sister  and  the  brother,  the  tender 
love,  surviving  changes  of  time  and  use,  resting 
as  a  halo  of  fidelity  and  constancy  over  the  heads 
of  husband  and  wife  and  wife  and  husband,  the 
grandeur  that  encircles  the  love  of  friend  for  friend 
with  the  laurel  wreath  of  fellowship  and  truth,  the 
higher  aspects  of  love  crowned  with  tender  minis- 
tration and  solicitude  existing  between  earth's 
highest  type  of  lovers,  finally,  and  under  all  cir- 
cumstances, eventually  passes  through  the  divine 
processes  of  spiritual  evolution  and  purification, 
yea  onward  and  upward  through  the  seven  Heav- 
ens of  transcendental  being,  until  the  true  magnifi- 
cence of  Christ's  prophecy  is  fulfilled,  "In  the 
resurrection  they  neither  marry  nor  are  given  in 
marriage,  but  are  as  the  angels  of  God  in  Heaven." 
To  be  understood ;  to  know  that  our  acts  call 
for  no  outward  explanation,  that  our  motives  are 


98  STUDIES    IN    CHARACTER. 

instinctively  perceived  and  our  careers  appreciated 
in  a  symmetrical  way;  this  begets  a  peace  and 
strength  that  the  world  can  neither  give  nor  take 
away.  As  nothing  exceeds  the  bliss  of  being  truly 
and  sympathetically  understood,  so  nothing  exceeds 
the  pain  of  being  misunderstood  when  our  motives 
are  right,  and  our  actions  up  to  our  highest  light 
are  made  the  consistent  offspring  of  our  motives. 
Perhaps  the  torture  that  comes  from  being  mis- 
understood tends  to  increase  the  joy  of  being 
understood.  Life's  ocean  is  smooth  and  her  skies 
cloudless  when  our  lives  and  purpose  are  under- 
stood. Her  seas  are  wildly  tempestuous  and  her 
heavens  lowering  with  darkened  clouds  when  our 
best  aims  and  activities  are  misunderstood.  We 
must  possess  a  conspicuous  portion  of  the  charac- 
ter of  Christ  Jesus  if  we  would  successfully  live 
above  the  ordeal  of  being  misunderstood  by  those 
whose  sympathy  we  most  crave,  or  by  the  masses 
whose  thought  we  would  uplift  and  whose  lives  we 
would  broaden.  To  be  understood  is  at  once  a 
a  reward    and   a   privilege ;    to    feel   that  even  if 


TO  UNDERSTAND  AND  TO  BE  UNDERSTOOD.  99 

appearances  point  to  inconsistency  and  error, 
hearts  filled  with  love,  compassion,  and  normal 
discernment,  perceive  the  true  import  of  our  words 
and  acts  and  therein  observe  the  evidences  of  defi- 
nite plan  and  righteous  procedure.  This  uplifts 
the  heart  and  lifts  our  natures  above  earth's  weari- 
some din.  To  be  so  thoroughly  understood  that 
our  moral  courage  in  uncovering  error  and  our 
loyalty  to  Principle  above  personality  is  justly 
analyzed  and  recognized  as  true  integrity,  this 
creates  a  holy  zeal  that  no  amount  of  unthinking 
or  ignorant  misunderstanding  can  touch  or  dismay. 
To  be  understood  in  the  little  things  of  life,  in  the 
everyday  words,  glances,  expressions,  acts,  and 
faintly  suggested  thoughts  which  make  up  the  de- 
tail of  daily  life  is  synonymous  with  listening  to 
the  music  of  the  spheres  and  abiding  "in  the  secret 
place  of  the  Most  High."  The  harmony  coming 
from  such  a  state  of  existence  as  this  reveals  God's 
rounded  plan  of  divine  love  in  which  all  know 
even  as  they  are  known,  see  face  to  face,  and 
worship  the  Father  in  spirit  and  in  truth,  love  each 


IOO  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

other  even  as  those  who  live  life's  psalm  of  mutual 
understanding.  To  be  understood  means  vastly 
more  than  mere  personal  attachment  and  loyalty. 
We  earn  this  rare  jewel  through  our  attainments 
in  the  world  of  understanding  others.  It  is  the 
divine  compensation  or  return  for  so  sympatheti- 
cally and  unselfishly  entering  into  the  interests  and 
progress  of  others  that  in  turn  they  see  in  us  the 
consistencies  of  the  divine  character,  and  realize 
the  significance  of  the  question,  How  can  you  love 
God  whom  you  have  not  seen  if  you  love  not  your 
brother  whom  you  have  seen? 


CRITICISM  AS  A  HABIT. 

[BY  PERMISSION.] 

Part  I. 

Judge  not  according  to  the  appearance. — Jesus. 

HUMAN  nature  in  the  concrete  is  a  curious 
collection  of  habits,  moods,  and  temperamental 
tendencies.  As  a  rule  the  human  mortal  mind 
combines  the  depraved  heredity  of  mortal  ances- 
try, the  materialism  of  present  existence,  and  very 
often  chronic  pessimism  in  its  outlook  on  the  yet- 
to-be-lived  future.  Some  people  allow  their  minds 
to  be  ruled  by  God,  the  Principle  of  all  that  is 
pure,  loving,  and  free.  Others  allow  blind  custom, 
habit,  superstition,  and  depraved  tendencies  to 
govern  them.  Still  another  class  willingly  sur- 
render the  rights  and  blessings  of  self-government 
to  the  arbitrary  dictates  of  those  persons  who  find 

1 01 


102  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

supreme  joy  in  managing  the  spiritual  and  private 
affairs  of  other  people. 

James  Bryce  of  England,  the  author  of  that 
classic  of  history  and  civil  government,  "The 
American  Commonwealth,"  says  that  the  bane  and 
curse  of  bossism,  or  the  despotic  sway  of  self- 
appointed  rulers,  is  the  greatest  menace  to  the 
peace,  integrity,  and  progress  of  democratic  or 
popular  government.  How  true  this  is,  and  how 
history  utters  its  solemn  amen  to  this  deduction  of 
the  eminent  English  scholar. 

The  human  or  personal  mind  has  many  bad 
methods  or  habits.  Some  of  these  customs  afflict 
humanity.  Others  are  wholly  suicidal,  while 
others  end  in  moral  imbecility  to  the  person  who 
indulges  in  them. 

Among  the  most  pernicious  habits  of  the 
human  mind  worry,  pessimism,  dishonesty,  un- 
chaste thinking,  selfishness,  and  the  spirit  of  unjust 
criticism  take  the  lead.  Of  these,  habitual  criti- 
cism is  perhaps  the  most  destructive,  contagious, 
and   least  restrained   of  any.     The   self-appointed 


CRITICISM    AS    A    HABIT.  I0.3 

critic  mistakes  personal  egotism  for  divine  leadings. 
The  habitual  critic  is  essentially  an  obstructionist. 
He  is  a  stranger  to  constructive  and  helpful 
methods.  Personal  opinion  has  become  his  ruler 
and  self-exaggeration  his  monitor.  His  views  are 
to  his  perverted  sense  synonymous  with  absolute 
right.    • 

Self-ignorance  begets  moral  color-blindness. 
Self-love  strives  to  embalm  the  dead  body  of 
erring  personal  self-hood  and  would  make  it,  as 
did  the  ancient  Egyptians,  their  skeleton  at  the 
feast,  an  ever-present  guest  at  its  own  selfish  altar 
worship.  The  critical  mind  looks  always  for  de- 
fects, for  imperfections,  and  for  variations  from  the 
recognized  standard  of  perfection.  The  chronic 
critic,  like  the  dog-in-the-manger  type  of  thought, 
will  neither  progress  Heavenward  itself,  nor  allow 
the  objects  of  its  criticism  to  advance. 

The  devotee  of  the  false  god  of  criticism  mag- 
nifies the  weed  and  ignores  or  fails  to  see  the  nest- 
ling flower.  He  scents  the  odor  of  decaying  wood 
and  roots  on  the  hillside,  but  passes  by  the  sweet, 


104  STUDIES    IN    CHARACTER. 

waiting,  fragrant  violets.  He  hears  the  cry  of  the 
little  child  and  calls  it  discord,  but  he  utterly  fails 
to  see  in  such  the  Princes  of  Christ's  own  King- 
dom, the  inheritors  of  Life's  richest  promises.  He 
loses  the  grand  in  his  smallness  of  vision  and  pur- 
sues the  phantom,  the  mirage,  and  the  ghost,  in- 
stead of  attaining  the  realism  of  living,  vitalizing 
Love.  He  ascends  the  hillock  of  self-opinionated 
belief  and  sees  a  few  inches  beyond  his  circum- 
scribed point  of  view.  He  calls  this  hillock  a 
mountain  of  vision,  this  limited  view  a  vista  well- 
nigh  infinite  in  extent. 

The  chronic  critic  is  a  self-appointed  court, 
judge,  jury,  verdict,  jail,  and  electric  chair  all  in 
one.  He  is  a  crystallized  fault-finder  among  his 
brethren,  an  anarchist  in  the  realm  of  individual 
rights.  He  feels  he  is  raised  up  to  manage  per- 
sonally his  fellows,  and  his  text  of  procedure  is, 
"The  end  justifies  the  means."  He  tears  down 
where  he  should  upbuild,  inspires  doubt  and  self- 
distrust  where  courage  and  hope  should  rule 
victorious 


CRITICISM    AS    A    HABIT.  105 

The  unspoken  yet  mentally  felt  influence  of  a 
critical  mind  touches  and  dampens,  as  a  cold 
ocean  fog,  the  ardor,  trust,  and  confidence  so 
necessary  to  the  art  of  right  living.  Probably  more 
than  any  one  other  human  characteristic  criticism 
increases  the  friction  of  human  existence.  As  an 
early  untimely  chill  it  enters  the  heart's  garden 
and  would  cover  with  the  white  frost  of  false  accu- 
sation the  lilies  of  chastity  and  innocence,  the 
violets  of  constancy  and  faithful  love,  and  the  roses 
of  loving  confidence  and  ministry. 

As  a  valley  mist  it  obscures  the  glorious  land- 
scape of  a  true  life  and  evolves  the  miasma  of 
scandal,  suspicion,  and  distrust  where  the  freedom 
of  noble  character  should  abide  as  its  own  king 
and   kingdom. 

Finally,  the  critical  habit  of  thought,  that  phase 
of  mind  which  opposes  for  the  sake  of  opposing, 
obstructs  so  that  it  can  count  for  something  on  the 
opposite  side  of  every  question,  that  criticises  be- 
cause it  is  neither  broad,  loving,  nor  spiritual 
enough  to  approve,  is  in  a  state  of  perpetual  ignor- 


106  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

ant  or  wilful  disobedience  to  Christ's  great  com- 
mandment, Judge  not.  The  vice  of  criticism  as  a 
habit  should  and  must  be  overcome  by  the  prac- 
tice of  the  simple  truths  of  Christ's  Sermon  on  the 
Mount,  and  by  the  gradual  acquisition  of  the  Mind 
of  the  Master  which  exalts  humility,  increases  un- 
selfishness, tempers  justice  with  mercy,  makes  love 
synonymous  with  right  judgment,  and  saith  to 
every  individual,  "Judge  not  according  to  the 
appearance,  but  judge  righteous  judgment." 


Part  II. 

Judge  righteous  judgment. — fesus. 

CRITICISM  as  a  habit  re-acts  upon  the  critic. 
It  tends  to  hide  from  him  the  sweetness,  the 
beauty,  and  the  righteousness  of  life  and  character. 
The  iniquitous  custom  of  judging  by  mere  appear- 
ances not  only  breaks  the  Christ-law,  but  assails 
the    most    sacred    rights    of    individuals.      Honest 


CRITICISM    AS    A    HABIT.  107 

natures  often  stand  abashed  before  the  silent 
judgment-seat  of  their  own  consciousness  on  learn- 
ing the  extent  to  which  their  unspoken  judgment 
of  others  has  proven  itself  erroneous.  Judgment 
or  criticism  by  appearances  rather  than  by  definite 
knowledge  and  righteousness  is  too  often  the  fixed 
habit  of  religionists  and  moralists. 

The  truth  of  life  spares  not  man  the  necessity 
of  judging  righteously.  Destructive,  fault-finding, 
flaw-picking,  egotistical  and  personal  criticism  is 
of  its  parent,  the  devil  or  evil.  It  is  the  exact  op- 
posite of  constructive  or  helpful  criticism,  alias 
righteous  judgment.  The  loving  criticism  that  is 
in  itself  admonition,  instruction,  and  true  fraternal 
help,  uplifts  the  character  that  is  privileged  to  re- 
ceive it.  It  strengthens  a  career,  intensifying  its 
capabilities,  enlarging  its  outlook,  perfecting  its 
methods,  and  polishing  and  reducing  to  symmetry 
its  crude  and  rough  edges.  Such  criticism  be- 
tween man  and  man,  worker  and  fellow-worker,  is 
the  essence  of  brotherhood.  This  is  the  only 
legitimate   criticism  that  should   be   habitual,  the 


108  STUDIES    IN   CHARACTER. 

only  genuine  judgment    that  is  truly  born  of  an 
interest  that  is  loving. 

Right  methods,  considerate,  sympathetic  ways 
of  imparting  help  or  offering  criticism,  should  al- 
ways accompany  all  efforts  made  to  assist  another. 
Bad,  unwise  methods  of  doing  good,  actuated  by 
the  best  of  motives,  often  lessen  the  benefits  that 
should  come  to  an  individual  from  offered  help. 
This  too  common  discrepancy  in  human  ways  of 
doing  things  that  exists  between  the  nature  of  a 
motive  and  the  manner  of  expressing  it  is  one  of 
the  most  potent  though  unseen  causes  of  human 
woe  and  tears  that  afflicts  humanity.     Under  the 
law  of    love,   fellowship,   brotherhood,   friendship, 
and  pure  human  association  are  as  one,  based  on 
reciprocity.     Giving,  sharing,  seeking  our  own  in 
another's  good  rather  than  selfish  self-seeking  and 
personal    ambition   for   power  or  place,  bases  all 
true  criticism  and  actuates  all  right  judgment. 

To  put  one's  self  mentally  in  another  person's 
place,  to  see  circumstances  as  he  observes  them, 
and  to  occupy  for  but  a  moment  his  point  of  view, 


CRITICISM    AS    A    HABIT.  IO9 

shows  the  too  anxious  critic  that  in  nine  cases  out 
of  ten  he  is  not  called  by  Divinity  to  judge  his 
fellow,  but  to  mind  his  own  business,  which  is  but 
a  commonplace  way  of  voicing  the  command, 
"Every  individual  must  work  out  his  own  prob- 
lem." If  in  the  law  courts  of  nations,  judges  and 
juries  should  come  to  decisions  and  pass  sentence 
before  receiving  evidence,  or  on  hearing  only  a 
part  of  it,  justice  would  be  but  a  phantom  and 
human  rights  a  misnomer.  In  most  cases  criticism 
is  based  on  either  habit,  prejudice,  or  self-love 
To  make  it  the  avenue  of  Love's  message  to  a  man 
or  a  woman  in  need  of  real  help  within  one's 
power  to  give,  let  it  always  be  clothed  in  vestments 
of  sweet,  pure,  tender  love ;  let  it  wear  as  a  crown 
the  laurel  wreath  of  honest,  patient  solicitude  for 
another's  progress  Heavenward,  and  allow  its  feet 
always  to  be  shod  with  that  passion  for  ministry 
and  loving  service  that  finds  supreme  bliss  in  obey- 
ing the  royal  law  of  Christian  discipleship,  "By 
this  shall  all  men  know  that  ye  are  my  disciples,  if 
ye  love  one  another." 


SELFISHNESS  AS  THE  ROOT 
CAUSE  OF  HUMAN  MISERY. 

Human  experience  reveals  in  an  unmistakable 
way  that  selfishness  is  the  root  evil  of  mortal  life 
and  the  chief  cause  of  friction  in  personal  associa- 
tion. The  law  of  instinctive  self-preservation, 
omnipresent  and  visible  in  every  form  of  animal 
life,  is  the  seed  plot  of  all  self-centeredness.  This 
instinctive  element,  strengthened  by  fear  and  in- 
fluenced by  self-interest,  will  among  animals  and 
low  types  of  human  mentality  eclipse  even  the 
parental  protective  instinct  and  sacrifice  its  own 
offspring  to  protect  itself  or  gain  a  desired  selfish 
end.  An  exact  analysis  of  selfishness  reveals  it  as 
the  latent  operating  parent  or  cause  of  all  forms  of 
sensuousness.  Is  not  self-indulgence  blind  to  the 
true  interests  of  others  and  merciless  with  the  rights 

of  individual  selfhood?     The   untiring  search   for 

no 


SELFISHNESS.  Ill 

personal  pleasure  is  selfishness  in  action.  Self- 
exaggeration,  egotism,  pride,  self-will,  self-right- 
eousness, self-justification,  and  mock  modesty  are 
but  branches  of  the  tree  of  selfishness,  whose  roots 
run  in  all  directions,  crossing,  recrossing,  and  in- 
tertwining one  another  in  the  clay  soil  of  personal 
self.  Jealousy,  the  most  insane  phase  of  human 
selfishness,  is  born  of  a  selfish  fear  of  loss  or  of 
being  personally  displaced  by  something  or  some- 
body. Tt  can  also  in  certain  cases  be  justly  attrib- 
uted to  ignorance  of  the  law  of  impersonal,  indi- 
vidual relationship  between  men  and  men,  women 
and  women,  and  between  men  and  women.  Love 
of  money  as  money  for  the  temporary  soulless 
power,  prestige  or  standing  that  it  gives  among 
the  people  of  the  world  is  an  essentially  selfish 
desire.  A  selfish  person  is  but  a  collection  of  self- 
centred  thoughts,  elbowing  everybody  and  every- 
body's rights  to  win  personal  position,  or  gain. 
Commercial  feudalism  in  business  affairs,  tariff 
retaliation,  merciless  coercive  competition,  arbi- 
trary monopoly,  sectarian  religious  criticism  say- 


112  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

ing  "I  am  holier  than  thou,"  and  blind  servitude 
to  conventionalism  in  society's  codes  and  to  unen- 
lightened public  opinion,  are  one  and  all  habits  of 
selfishness  in  a  nation.  Hence  a  selfish  nation  is 
but  a  collection  of  selfish  persons  perpetuating  the 
heartless  law  of  human  greed  and  mere  self-protec- 
tion on  a  large  scale.  Mental  partisanship,  one- 
sided condemnation,  harsh,  ignorant  judgment, 
and  the  absence  of  the  judicial  habit  of  thought 
which  suspends  final  judgment  or  settled  opinion 
until  the  evidence  is  all  in,  are  but  so  many  well 
defined  symptoms  of  a  selfish  or  one-sided  view 
point.  These  common  every-day  errors  in  social 
life  and  human  intercourse,  whether  in  the  home 
or  in  the  state,  are  the  little  foxes  that  spoil  the 
vines  of  human  happiness,  harmony,  and  true 
friendship,  the  crowning  joy  of  which  is  reciprocal 
companionship  founded  on  a  selfish  ministry  of 
love.  The  habit  of  monopolizing  in  conversation, 
of  being  an  aggressive  dominating  talker  but  a  bad 
listener,  of  being  tardy  in  keeping  appointments 
and  engagements,  are  evidences  of  latent  human 


SELFISHNESS.  113 

selfishness,  ultimating  in  a  self-blindness  unmindful 
alike  of  the  rights  as  well  as  the  convenience  of 
others.  The  tendency  to  get  and  not  give,  to  ab- 
sorb and  not  radiate  or  share,  and  to  habitually 
excuse  self-guilt  in  minor  things  as  well  as  in 
things  of  large  significance,  is  part  of  the  occultism 
of  selfishness.  Bad  manners,  lack  of  elegance  or 
refinement,  and  crude  methods  in  the  small  things 
of  life,  as  often  have  their  origin  in  an  inrooted, 
ingrowing  selfishness  as  in  actual  ignorance  of 
right  standards  of  propriety.  Brusqueness  in 
speech,  manner  and  act,  cruel  methods  in  doing 
things  which  in  themselves  are  noble  and  pure, 
invariably  reveal  basic  selfishness,  else  an  abnor- 
mal sense  of  fear,  dangerous  alike  to  the  peace  and 
welfare  of  one's  self  and  others.  Moral  color- 
blindness, a  deadened  intuition  regarding  right, 
honesty,  or  purity,  disclose  an  intimate  acquaint- 
ance with  Adamic  or  material  selfhood.  They 
also  reveal  an  imperfect  understanding  of  the  eter- 
nal unselfed  Self,  i.e.,  eternal  Good.  It  is  as  un- 
healthy and  demoralizing  to  live  in  the  company 


114  STUDIES   IN    CHARACTER. 

and  atmosphere  of  one's  unholy,  unhealthy,  mor- 
bid, selfish  thoughts  as  to  abide  in  the  presence  of 
depraved  people.  Thus  the  undue  self-contempla- 
tion of  a  selfish  person  tends  to  shut  such  a  one 
out  from  the  sunshine  and  holiness  of  the  true  self- 
hood of  man,  which  is  the  image  and  likeness  of 
the  All-Perfect.  Selfishness  invariably  loses  sub- 
stance for  shadow,  and  drops  the  real  coin  to  gain 
the  counterfeit,  only  because  the  latter  seems  more 
highly  colored  than  the  former.  Great  was  the 
perception  of  Jesus  when  he  said:  "Whosoever 
shall  lose  his  life  for  my  sake  shall  find  it." 

The  surrender  of  all  merely  selfish  aims  and 
methods,  the  voluntary  giving  up  of  worldliness  in 
all  its  forms,  ends  in  genuine  self-revelation,  the 
discovery  of  the  divine  self-love,  which  as  a  reflect- 
ing mirror  reveals  the  higher  or  real  character  of 
man  in  the  likeness  of  God.  Carelessness,  indiffer- 
ence, thoughtlessness,  methodical  exclusiveness, 
undue  dependence  on  persons  or  personal  author- 
ity, impetuosity  and  love  of  control  are  more  the 
products  of  the  miasmic  swamp  of  selfishness  than 


SELFISHNESS.  I  I  5 

of  either  ignorance,  mental  provincialism,  or  "bad 
bringing  up."  Selfishness  is  jealous  of  its  own 
ambitions,  purposes,  and  ends.  It  surrounds  itself 
with  its  own  votaries,  sits  upon  the  throne  of  self- 
ignorance,  and  to  its  throne-room  allows  only 
those  who  minister  and  add  to  its  insatiable  thirst 
for  increased  glorification  and  power.  At  the 
throne-room  door  it  places  as  sergeant-at-arms  its 
dupe  and  chief  helper,  "Fear-of-personal-loss,"  with 
orders  to  admit  only  such  helping  co-operative 
thoughts  as  personal  ambition,  love  of  gain,  lust, 
and  so  on.  Egotism,  self-asserting  and  stupid, 
tries  to  present  the  personal  equation  at  all  times 
and  under  all  conditions.  Egoism,  the  divine  op- 
posite of  egotism,  asserts  divine  Intelligence  as  the 
source  of  all  wisdom  and  right  action.  This  true 
sense  of  God  and  man  shows  that  man  shines  by 
borrowed  light,  is  never  absorbed,  but  with  spirit- 
ual growth  enters  into  an  enlarged  sense  of  the 
individuality  and  majestic  sovereignty  of  the  idea 
of  Divine  Mind.  The  thought  of  man  has  but  to 
recall    history    to    gain    full    confirmation    of    the 


Il6  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

axiom,  "Selfishness  is  a  law  of  self-destruction, 
and  the  best  method  practiced  by  men  to  lose  the 
best  in  life." 

The  ancient  Pagan  deification  of  human  pas- 
sions in  gods  and  goddesses  was  but  the  subtle 
operation  of  materialistic  sex-selfishness.  The  old 
religious  theory  of  an  exclusive  tribal  Jehovah, 
loving  one  nation  and  hating  all  others,  is  an  in- 
stance of  religious  selfishness.  The  awful  human 
sacrifices  in  the  rites  of  the  primitive  worshippers 
of  the  sun  and  the  elements,  reveal  the  old  Adamic 
willingness  to  slaughter  others  in  order  to  propiti- 
ate the  anger  of  the  gods  against  those  who  were 
to  remain  alive  after  the  innocent  and  noble  victims 
had  been  sacrificed.  Selfishness  instituted  and 
perpetuated  human  slavery  in  ancient  and  modern 
times.  A  rebuked  sensual  selfishness  beheaded 
John  the  Baptist,  freed  Barabbas,  and  crucified 
Jesus.  Citadelized  selfishness  stoned  Stephen, 
killed  the  early  Christians,  instituted  the  Inquisi- 
tion, burned  Savanarola,  drove  the  Puritans  from 
England    and     Holland    to    America,    indirectly 


SELFISHNESS.  U7 

brought  about  the  French  Revolution,  begot  the 
Napoleonic  ambitions  which  terminated  at  Water- 
loo and  St.  Helena,  and  in  many  instances  the 
awful  war  conflicts  and  butcheries  of  ancient  and 
modern  history.  Human  avarice,  love  of  posses- 
sion, and  mental  stolidity  have  fought  the  begin- 
ning and  establishment  of  virtually  every  develop- 
ment and  improvement  in  religion,  science,  cura- 
tive therapeutics,  invention,  government,  education, 
and  industrial  progress  from  the  time  the  fire- 
worshippers  opposed  the  all-nature  devotees  and 
the  ancient  incantationists  fought  the  first  herb- 
healing  Pagan  priests.  And  as  if  to  be  consistent 
with  its  past  history  this  same  mortal  mind  despot 
during  the  last  month  of  the  first  year  of  the  20th 
century  attempted  to  drive  the  inventor  of  the 
greatest  scientific  triumph  of  the  new  century, 
wireless  telegraphy,  out  of  Newfoundland,  because 
wireless  telegraphy  promised  to  be  a  menace  to 
the  established  income  of  present  cable  systems. 
Thus  men  advance  in  spite  of,  not  because  of, 
their  own  human  natures. 


RIGHT  HUMAN  RELATIONS. 

[BY  PERMISSION.] 

THE  AGGREGATION  of  good  traits  in  a  charac- 
ter is  prophetic  of  entire  ultimate  perfection;  these 
traits  counterbalance  the  weaknesses  of  nature,  and 
while  making  no  excuse  for  them,  they  bid  us  be 
patient  with  them  until  they  are  destroyed  by  the 
good.  We  have  no  right  to  demand  perfection 
from  our  fellows  until  we  can  offer  them  perfection 
in  ourselves. 

Things  that  are  equal  to  the  same  thing  are 
equal  to  each  other ;  so  men  and  women,  if  in  har- 
mony with  God,  will  be  in  harmony  with  the  God- 
like man  or  woman  wherever  found.  This  is 
emphasized  and  demonstrated  both  in  the  teaching 
and  practice  of  Christian  Science. 

He  is  a  law  unto  himself  who   abides   by  the 

unchangeable  mandates  of  the  divine  law  of  good, 

uS 


RIGHT    HUMAN    RELATIONS.  I  19 

Love,  purity.  Such  a  nature  mistakes  not  license 
for  liberty,  nor  does  it  antagonize  any  phase  of 
right  law,  but  is  latently  and  consciously  in  har- 
mony with  the  spiritual  law  of  Being,  the  safeguard 
of  society,  and  the  protector  of  the  individual. 

A  man's  acquaintances  may  be  many  while  his 
friends  be  few,  yet  let  it  be  remembered  that  a 
society  of  friends  constituted  the  social  and  reli- 
gious ideal  of  humanity's  highest  type  of  friend, — 
the  Palestine  Teacher.  Hold  not  too  lightly  the 
sacred  word  friend ;  reserve  it  for  the  true  and 
tried  of  life, —  those  men  and  women  who  have, 
perchance,  been  made  to  suffer  for  publicly  and 
privately  upholding  your  cause  or  defending  your 
integrity  when  the  cost  was  large  and  the  hour 
fraught  with  misgivings.  Confound  not  the  hero- 
worshipper  or  partisan  supporter,  blind  and  noisy, 
with  the  friend  in  whose  presence  you  can  think 
aloud,  the  friend  who  loves  the  good  he  sees  in 
you  and  who  rebukes  and  faithfully  points  out  the 
error  and  weaknesses.  Be  suspicious  of  him  who 
thinks  you  well-nigh  perfect,  whose  adoration  in  a 


120  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

twinkling  turns  to  fiery  hatred  or  unjust  criticism ; 
such  revulsion  of  feeling  invariably  follows  an  ex- 
travagant estimate  of  character  which  is  neither 
correct  nor  sane. 

Let  us  look  well  to  our  own  defects  and  be  pa- 
tient with  those  of  our  friend.  Like  balls  that 
meet,  the  portions  that  touch  represent  but  a  small 
part  of  the  whole,  yet  be  glad  and  rejoice  that  at 
this  stage  of  divine  character-building,  you  find  as 
much  in  common  with  your  fellows  as  you  do. 
Let  the  community  of  interests  already  established 
lead  on  to  that  full  unity  of  nature  which  consti- 
tutes the  bridal  of  the  highest.  Use  not  the  un- 
selfish interest  in  your  affairs  shown  by  your  true 
and  tried  friends  as  a  dumping-ground  for  your 
refuse  cares,  worries,  fears,  and  delusions.  True 
it  is  that  love  is  reciprocal,  and  unselfishness  a 
mutual  grace  which  prospers  most  in  the  soil  of 
human  interchange  of  hope  and  fear.  Yet  remem- 
ber that  the  entrance  gate  to  the  solution  of  many 
a  life  problem  and  trial  is  a  solitary  gate,  through 
which  you  must  pass  in  all  the  isolation  of  indi- 


RIGHT    HUMAN    RELATIONS.  121 

vidual  experience.  Friends  will  lovingly  labor  to 
answer  your  questioning  heart,  you  will  vainly 
compare  experiences  in  order  to  gain  light  on  the 
mysteries  of  your  own,  but  all  to  no  avail,  the 
answer,  the  solution,  yea,  the  exaltation  that  is  be- 
fore you,  are  in  the  hands  of  the  Eternal.  Into  the 
sacred  sanctuary  of  individual  communion  with 
God  you  must  enter,  there  awaits  you  the  new 
name,  the  baptism  of  repentance,  and  the  Jacob's 
ladder  of  spiritual  ascent;  and  well  it  is  that  such 
is  the  life-law.  It  turns  man  from  human  to  divine 
dependence,  it  fosters  spiritual  growth,  and  through 
the  deepest  and  most  painful  experiences  of  life 
reveals  the  truth  that  at  all  times 


Standeth  God  within  the  shadow,  keeping  watch 
above  his  own. 


A  man  is  called  upon  by  the  demands  of  justice 
to  take  account  of  his  brother's  limitations  and 
shortcomings  as  much  as  he  is  expected  to  sup- 
port him  in  his  strong  points.  Were  this  truism 
more  largely  observed  we  would  experience  fewer 


122  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

heartbreaking  disappointments  in  people,  rave  less 
over  those  who  fall  short  of  the  fictitious  standards 
we  have  set  up  for  them,  and  be  more  lovingly- 
humane  in  our  dealings  with  all  men  and  all 
women. 

We  should  be  slow  to  borrow,  but  if  we  do,  we 
should  studiously  keep  the  transaction  on  a  busi- 
ness basis  of  equity, —  security  offered  and  value 
received.  We  should  also  be  slow  to  lend  if  we 
would  help  our  friends,  and  keep  the  good-will  of 
our  acquaintances.  Lending  and  borrowing  as  a 
rule  are  make-shifts,  as  means  they  rarely  solve 
serious  situations  and  in  most  cases  are  but  anaes- 
thetics administered  to  an  inconvenient  or  trying 
condition.  Undue  or  enforced  obligation  often 
tends  to  create  a  peculiar,  unexplainable  resent- 
ment, even  toward  friends  and  benefactors.  The 
psychology  of  this  mental  state  or  attitude  shows 
the  abnormal  status  of  dependence,  and  the  nor- 
mality of  independence.  True  it  is  that  "circum- 
stances alter  cases,"  and  "there  are  exceptions  to 
all  rules."     But  the  "circumstances"  and  "excep- 


RIGHT    HUMAN    RELATIONS.  1 23 

tions"  which  modify  the  deductions  under  consid- 
eration as  to  borrowing  and  lending  are  few.  The 
friendship  or  relationship  that  successfully  survives 
a  close  range  money  transaction  of  any  sort  and 
emerges  from  its  mystical  atmosphere  with  mutual 
respect  unchanged  and  affection  increased,  can  be 
relied  upon  to  weather  virtually  any  storm  on  the 
ocean  of  human  events. 

We  should  be  independent,  but  not  brusque, 
dignified,  but  not  haughty  or  insolently  unmindful 
of  the  interdependence  of  human  association.  In 
the  words  of  Matthew  Arnold, — 

Resolve  to  be  thyself,  and  know  that  he 
Who  finds  himself,  loses  his  misery. 

To  find  one's  self  is  to  find  man  as  the  image  and 
likeness  of  God.  This  attainment  involves  the 
prior  finding,  through  thought  ascension,  of  the 
divine  nature,  its  essence  and  law.  Thus  is  re- 
vealed to  us  the  true  self-love  whose  self-assertion 
is  egoistic,  not  egotistic.  By  this  self-discovery  the 
seer  becomes  prophet  of  God  and  servant  of  man. 


124  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

We  should  be  fearless.  Act  and  speak  as  those 
conscious  of  their  divine  origin  and  immortal  des- 
tiny. We  should  live  as  citizens  of  Israel's  com- 
monwealth,—  inheritors  of  divinely  ordained  do- 
minion. Let  us  not  tremble  under  the  harshness 
of  cruel  or  ignorant  criticism.  Let  us  with  right- 
eous indifference  pass  by  the  petty  shafts  of  "they 
say."  Let  us  have  a  hearing  ear  for  helpful  criti- 
cism, and  listen  well  to  our  opponents  for  we  shall 
often  make  solid  gain  from  some  of  their  frank, 
outspoken  comments.  Let  us  divide  between  what 
is  true  and  what  is  false,  and  above  all,  avoid  mes- 
merism of  self-pity  on  the  one  hand  and  self-satis- 
faction and  glorification  on  the  other. 

We  should  avoid  posing,  be  sincere.  Honest 
mistakes  are  better  than  insincerity;  for  the  former, 
once  seen,  are  repented  of  and  remedied,  while  the 
latter  are  used  to  justify  latent  dishonesty.  Better 
the  simplicity  that  at  first  analysis  seems  common- 
place, than  the  duplicity  and  false  martyr-spirit 
which  parade  as  saintly  attributes  in  the  vestments 
of  the  reformer. 


RIGHT    HUMAN    RELATIONS.  1 25 

When  a  wrong  is  truly  forgiven  it  is  forgotten. 
We  should  not  say  that  we  "can  forgive,  but  not 
forget,"  for  the  true  act  of  forgiveness  includes  the 
destruction  of  the  error.  Thus  destroyed,  it  passes 
out  of  mind  and  memory  and  a  true  love  relation- 
ship rises  from  its  ashes.  Thus  is  wrought  the 
miracle  of  love  and  justice  blending  in  one  celestial 
essence. 

Let  us  watch  lest  the  habit  of  criticism  fasten 
itself  upon  us.  Let  us  pray  to  be  delivered  from 
pessimism,  chronic  criticism,  skepticism,  and  the 
lifeless  moods  of  indifference.  A  fool  can  criticise 
anything  and  everybody,  but  a  man  must  be  wise 
in  experience  to  approve  intelligently  and  under- 
stand. Iconoclastic  methods  do  but  little  good 
and  work  much  harm.  It  is  easier  to  tear  down 
than  to  build  up,  easier  to  give  elaborate  analysis 
of  evil  and  evil  doing  than  to  explain  the  infinitude 
of  good  and  unfold  each  day  in  its  pure  beauty  of 
nature.  Hence  wise  is  he  who  makes  his  criticism 
constructive  as  well  as  helpful  and  lovingly  frank, 
who    looks    for   good    rather  than   evil,   and  who 


126  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

"judges  not  according   to  the   appearance,"    but 
judges  "righteous  judgment." 

We  should  see  to  it  that  prejudice  is  uprooted 
from  our  nature,  and  cast  out,  else  life's  most 
blessed  gifts  will  pass  us  by.  Prejudice  is  a  des- 
potic, ignorant,  mental  slave-holder,  which  pre- 
judges and  pronounces  sentence  without  evidence, 
judge,  or  jury.  Let  us  flee  its  domain,  for  it  is  a 
false  witness,  stupid,  dishonest,  and  short-sighted. 
It  separates  friends,  impedes  human  progress,  be- 
friends bad  institutions,  obstructs  good  causes,  per- 
petuates the  enslavement  of  body  and  mind,  and 
wars  against  the  best  interests  of  the  race. 

Love  to  God  and  love  to  man  constitute  the 
essence  of  the  two  great  commandments  set  forth 
by  Moses  and  Jesus.  Let  us  strive  to  be  as  faith- 
ful to  the  second  as  to  the  first,  for  the  Master  said 
that  the  second  was  like  unto  the  first.  Let  us  be 
patient  with  ourselves  and  with  others.  Let  each 
day  add  to  our  store  of  Christ-like  character  till  at 
last  we  find  the  New  Jerusalem, —  our  natural 
abiding  place. 


TRUE  FAITH. 

[BY  PERMISSION.] 

According  to  your  faith  be  it  unto  you. — Jesus. 

FAITH  is  a  conviction  which  includes  past, 
present,  and  future.  Faith  bases  its  optimistic 
hopes  for  the  morrow  upon  the  proven  and  re- 
ceived blessings  of  yesterday  and  to-day.  Faith 
daily  increases  her  store  of  confidence,  and  there- 
fore awaits  with  patience  the  things  which  the 
future  holds  in  store.  Faith  connects  the  individual 
with  the  reformers  of  all  periods,  with  the  idealists 
of  the  present  age,  and  with  that  glorious  company 
of  men  and  women  of  the  days  to  be  who  will  be 
the  reapers  and  gleaners  in  the  fields  of  earnest 
endeavor  wherein  we  have  sown  the  seed  of  right- 
eousness. Faith  merges  into  understanding  in 
one  instance,  only  to  progress  as  a  higher  form  of 

127 


128  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

faith,  and  is  ready  to  take  the  next  step  in  the  line 
of  light.  Faith  in  certain  truths  becomes  an 
understanding  of  these  truths  only  as  the  Science 
of  Life  is  gradually  mastered,  and  demonstration 
supersedes  belief,  yet  because  of  the  infinitude  of 
Truth  the  unattained  and  undemonstrated  truths  of 
life  constantly  demand  the  renewal  of  faith  and  the 
increase  of  hope.  We  no  sooner  win  the  objects 
of  our  high  hopes  than  we  gain  glimpses  of  condi- 
tions beyond,  on  the  future's  horizon,  which  seem 
to  reduce  almost  to  miniature  the  things  for  which 
we  have  so  laboriously  toiled.  Thus  we  learn  that 
eternal  progression  constitutes  eternal  life,  and  that 
each  day  must  be  complete  in  itself. 

We  walk  by  faith  oftener  than  by  sight.  The 
major  part  of  daily  living  is  made  up  of  faith  in 
action,  subdividing  itself  into  what  is  termed  con- 
fidence, conviction,  trust,  optimism,  hope,  and 
courage.  The  first  movement  in  mental  action  is 
invariably  one  of  faith.  True,  it  may  be  toward 
the  acceptance  of  a  demonstrable  premise,  but  the 
acceptance  of  the  premise  as  a  proposition,  is  a 


TRUE    FAITH.  1 29 

process  of  faith.  Proof  and  visible  results  may 
follow  allowing  understanding  to  supersede  mere 
faith,  but  the  primary  step  still  remains  one  of 
faith.  The  basic  assumption  of  all  being,  —  belief 
in  the  existence  of  a  Supreme  Being,  —  is  premised 
upon  a  mental  act  of  faith  as  set  forth  in  the  Scrip- 
tural declaration:  "He  that  cometh  to  God  must 
believe  that  he  is."  Thus  faith  opens  to  man  the 
possibility  of  knowing  the  most  High.  Faith  is 
spiritual  patience,  and  patience  is  systematized 
faith.  A  uniform  faith  in  the  triumph  of  good 
over  all  evil  manifests  itself  in  poised  optimism, 
good  cheer,  and  directness  of  speech  and  action. 
The  vitality  of  faith  is  unique,  and  its  power  be- 
yond human  estimate.  How  often  throughout  the 
course  of  life's  way  is  the  heart  lifted  to  levels  of 
celestial  vision.  How  from  time  to  time  the  dis- 
tant fields,  ever  green  and  inviting,  are  in  plain 
sight  from  the  summit  of  exaltation  occupied 
through  this  grace  of  God,  above  the  ashes  of 
some  temptation  or  materialistic  tendency  over- 
come.    And  again,  how  often,  O  how  often  !   are 


130  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

we  called  upon  to  go  down  into  the  valleys  and 
low  places  of  human  experience,  which  lie  be- 
tween the  mountains  of  vision,  and  work  out  the 
problem  of  life,  illumined  by  the  ever-present 
memory  of  the  glory  beheld  on  the  heights.  Here 
must  faith  become  a  guardian  angel,  here  must 
trust,  ever  pointing  to  the  vision  given  us,  beckon 
to  the  practical  attainment  of  that  which  has  been 
seen  and  felt,  not  in  comprehension  or  full  under- 
standing, but  in  that  perceptive  sense  of  future 
dominion  which  is  the  essential  forerunner  of  the 
heavenly  estate  of  man.  Thus  among  the  valley 
fogs  of  doubt  and  fear,  amidst  the  earth  damps  of 
human  misunderstanding,  and  in  the  center  of  the 
monotony  of  the  commonplace,  which  for  a  time 
seems  shorn  of  the  ideal,  are  all  called  upon  to 
"walk  by  faith,  not  by  sight." 

Faith,  the  song-bird  of  the  everlasting  Love  in 
the  heart  of  man,  under  such  circumstances  lifts 
the  nature  as  "on  wings  of  eagles,"  above  the 
shadows,  and  enables  every  prayerful,  honest  heart 
to  find  its  way  upward  to  a  still  greater  mountain- 


TRUE    FAITH.  1 3  I 

top  of  experience.  Thus  is  fulfilled  the  promise, 
"He  that  endureth  unto  the  end  shall  be  saved." 
Faith  is  a  form  of  universal  encouragement.  The 
success  of  every  department  of  life  is  dependent 
upon  it.  Faith  in  God,  faith  in  one's  self  as  the 
image  of  the  Eternal,  and  faith  in  the  might  of 
right  and  the  omnipotence  of  Love,  —  these  three 
types  of  spiritual  confidence  make  progress  in 
righteousness  and  brotherhood  a  certainty.  Amidst 
the  detail  of  conflicting  human  experiences  faith  is 
on  the  side  of  the  long  look  ahead,  while  fear  inva- 
riably takes  its  place  on  the  short  look  about  us. 
At  just  this  point  enlightened  faith  merges  into 
understanding,  and  man  can  look  calmly  and  fear- 
lessly upon  conditions  once  perplexing  and  fearful, 
but  now  seen  as  the  fusing  or  disappearing  of  ele- 
ments or  errors  in  the  chemistry  of  Mind,  —  God. 

Channing  once  wrote  "the  science  of  mind  dis- 
poses of  Satan."  Faith  is  a  fundamental  in  mind- 
science  :  first,  as  a  means  to  primary  steps ;  sec- 
ond, as  a  mental  chain  from  one  phase  of  proof  or 
demonstration  to  another.     Satan,  or  evil,  is  dis- 


132  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

posed  of,  destroyed  to  the  consciousness  of  the 
individual,  in  the  ratio  that  it  finds  no  abiding- 
place  in  his  life  or  motives.  It  is  the  positive, 
affirmative,  progressive  humane  faith  that  conquers 
the  world,  purifies  civilization,  blends  nations, 
universalizes  fraternal  love,  and  destroys,  through 
the  spiritual  God-law,  disease,  pain,  and  moral 
depravity. 

Faith  in  God  includes  faith  in  the  triumph  of 
right  in  every  case.  How  often  we  find  ourselves 
doubting  the  justice  of  life's  common  law  of  cause 
and  effect,  when  observing  the  temporary  seeming 
prosperity  of  the  wrong-doer,  and  the  travail  of  the 
right-doer.  Failing  to  use  the  eye  of  faith  to  see 
the  penalty  just  ahead  awaiting  the  former  and  the 
reward  of  righteousness  even  nearer  the  latter,  we 
let  doubt  and  skepticism  creep  in,  to  the  tempo- 
rary exclusion  of  the  faith  that  removeth  moun- 
tains. 

How  sweet  the  companionship  of  faith  I  How 
often  has  its  solace  cheered  and  comforted  when 
alone  and  seemingly  forsaken  amidst  the  shadows 


TRUE    FAITH.  133 

of  bitter  test  or  disappointment!  High  hopes 
often  measure  the  heights  of  our  faith,  while 
spiritual  longing  for  perfection  uses  faith  as  its 
ever-present  helpmate.  Faith  in  good  is  a  uni- 
versal medium  of  exchange  in  human  experience, 
and  unites  all  men  in  the  unity  of  right  motive  and 
moral  action.  Beyond  the  levels  of  faith  exist 
those  of  understanding,  making  mental  unity  de- 
monstrable and  spiritual  healing  and  regeneration 
possible.  Herein  abides  the  simple  and  practical 
worth  of  operative  Christian  Science.  Through 
Christian  Science  religion  no  longer  remains  a 
mode  of  belief  or  abstract  faith,  but  becomes  a 
systematic,  spiritually  mental  method  of  healing 
organic  and  functional  bodily  disease,  destroying 
evil  and  conquering  the  causes  of  physical  death. 
True  faith  is  under  all  conditions  a  healing,  saving 
element  in  its  work ;  yet  to  it  is  added  an  under- 
standing of  the  divine  Principle  of  the  universe, — 
God,  —  that  removes  religion  from  the  realm  of 
emotional  assent  or  dogmatic  opinion  and  places  it 
at  the  head  of  the  exact  sciences,  yea,  reveals  it  as 


134  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

the  Science  of  sciences,  —  the  Science  of  being. 
Enlightened  faith  is  a  curative,  helpful  element, 
and  should  be  cultivated  by  all  who  strive  to  heal 
disease,  remove  sin,  or  enrich  daily  living. 

All  who  seek  health  and  happiness  from  the 
religion  of  Jesus  should  increase  daily  in  hope, 
faith,  and  in  the  conviction  that  God  means  that 
all  shall  be  well,  strong,  and  spiritually  minded. 

Faith  in  the  perfection  of  God,  in  the  individ- 
uality of  man,  and  in  the  inevitable  survival  of  the 
pure  in  heart,  combine  as  one  in  the  nature  that 
accepts  with  its  whole  strength  the  promise  of 
Jesus,  "Ye  shall  know  the  truth,  and  the  truth 
shall  make  you  free." 

The  restoration  of  the  transcendentalism  of 
Jesus  and  of  St.  John  through  the  ministry  of 
Christian  Science  proves  that  the  age  of  miracles 
has  not  passed,  because  the  age  of  spiritual  mar- 
vels and  of  faith  has  not  passed.  Christian  Science 
is  Christian  intelligence  utilizing  both  faith  and 
understanding  in  the  great  work  of  evangelizing 
the  world.     Universalized  Christianity  is  of  neces- 


TRUE    FAITH.  135 

sity  scientific  Christianity,  and  Christian  Science, 
accepted  as  it  is  by  virtually  every  phase  of  men- 
tal make-up  among  men,  proves  itself  not  only  the 
"defender  of  the  Faith,"  but  a  living,  pulsating 
exemplification  of  the  healing  Christ,  Immanuel, 
God-with-us. 

The  new  age  of  faith  born  out  of  the  depths  of 
a  world-wide  materialism  in  religion,  philosophy, 
and  therapeutics,  calls  with  trumpet  voice  to  the 
inhabitants  of  earth,  "According  to  your  faith  be 
it  unto  you." 

The  world  is  weary  of  new  tracts  of  thought 

That  lead  to  nought  — 
Sick  of  quack  remedies  prescribed  in  vain 

For  mortal  pain; 
Yet  still  above  them  all  one  Figure  stands 

With  outstretched  hands. 

"O  thou  of  little  faith  !  "  sets  forth  the  rebuke 
of  the  Master.  His  tribute  to  the  trusting  centu- 
rion, "I  have  not  found  so  great  faith,  no,  not  in 
Israel,"  registers  his  spiritually  keen  recognition  of 
the  inestimable  value  of  faith. 

Let  us,  while  adding  to  our  faith,  understand- 


136  STUDIES   IN    CHARACTER. 

ing,  so  renew  and  spiritualize  the  quality  of  our 
faith  that  the  life  we  now  live  shall  be  glorified  and 
enriched  by  the  things  which  make  for  purity, 
love,  and  peace. 


FREEDOM. 

"  You  shall  know  the  Truth  and  the  Truth  shall  make  you 

free. ' '  — Jesus. 

FREEDOM  is  to  character  what  sunshine  is  to 
the  flower.  Freedom  is  the  atmosphere  with  which 
the  eternal  Mind  designs  that  all  creatures  shall  be 
surrounded.  Freedom  is  that  state  of  being  which 
holds  sway  when  the  individual  is  in  harmony  with 
the  divine  nature.  It  is  not  a  state  of  existence 
attainable  merely  through  personal  effort.  Rather 
is  it  the  normal  and  legitimate  outcome  of  mental 
conformity  on  the  part  of  the  individual  to  the 
divine  Mind.  Freedom  or  liberty  is  the  only  legit- 
imate state  of  man.  All  else  is  unnatural,  abnor- 
mal, and  degrading.  The  dignity  of  individuality 
is  allied  to  and  dependent  on  the  dignity  of  the 
infinite  individualities  in  which  all  lesser  individ- 
ualities are  reflections.      As  the   integrity  of    the 

i37 


138  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

real  character  of  man  is  based  upon  the  self-exist- 
ent perfection  of  the  infinite  nature  that  we  call 
God,  so  man's  progressive  possibilities  manifest 
the  harmonious  selfhood  of  his  Ego  or  Principle. 
The  divine  plan  of  existence  is  trinitarian  as  well 
as  universal.  The  infinite  Mind,  or  one  God,  is  the 
Principle  of  universal  existence,  individuality,  and 
manifestation  The  universal  expression  of  the 
divine  Mind  we  call  the  universe  including  man. 
The  law  or  spiritual  sense  through  which  man 
understands  and  takes  dominion  over  the  universe, 
and  through  which  he  grows  into  an  understanding 
of  the  nature  of  God,  is  the  third  essential  element 
in  the  trinitarian  plan  of  Father,  idea,  or  manifes- 
tation and  spiritual  law  or  divine  interpreter.  All 
freedom  begins  and  ends  with  mentality.  True 
freedom  is  neither  limited  nor  circumscribed.  It 
gives  the  same  normal  liberty  and  freedom  from 
discord  and  pain  to  the  body  that  it  gives  to  the 
soul  character  or  mentality  of  the  individual. 

As    an    individual    comes    into    harmony   with 
God,  the  Principle  of  being,  its  divine  selfhood  is 


FREEDOM.  139 

progressively  attained  and  freedom  is  the  very 
essence  of  this  being.  When  the  founder  of  the 
Christian  religion  affirmed  that  those  who  under- 
stood the  essence  of  his  teachings  should  know  the 
Truth  and  this  knowledge  should  make  them  free, 
he  uttered  the  greatest  promise  of  the  centuries. 
Freedom  is  an  all-inclusive  term.  It  does  not 
mean  simply  deliverance  from  certain  phases  of 
bondage  and  slavery.  It  signifies  an  infinitude  of 
liberty  and  emancipation  from  all  that  degrades, 
produces  pain  and  discord,  all  that  limits  the  men- 
tal vision  and  interferes  with  the  divine  rights  of 
individuality.  Man's  self-government  means  gov- 
ernment by  his  higher  or  egoistic  self.  This  self 
being  a  manifestation  or  reflection  of  the  eternal 
selfhood  of  divine  Mind  involves  the  government 
of  the  individual  by  God. 

Slavery  has  many  forms.  Its  ramifications 
sometimes  seem  almost  infinite.  The  lower  forms 
of  human  or  bodily  slavery  are  fast  being  de- 
stroyed by  the  march  of  civilization  and  humani- 
tarian ideals  among  the  citizens  and  religionists  of 


I40  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

the  world.  Emancipation  from  the  remaining 
forms  of  slavery  is  the  great  work  of  this  and  the 
coming  centuries.  The  horrors  of  physical  or 
bodily  slavery  in  past  ages  have  come  from  the 
fallacious  belief  that  one  individual  has  the  right 
to  own  and  govern  another.  This  outrageous 
assumption  is  not  yet  wholly  extinct  in  the  hearts 
of  men.  Perhaps  the  strongest  element  in  human 
nature  is  the  love  of  leadership  allied  to  ownership. 
This  tendency  expresses  itself  throughout  all  stratas 
of  human  society  from  the  arbitrary  Indian  chief 
up  to  and  including  the  monarch,  whose  despotic 
sway,  based  according  to  his  belief  on  the  divine 
right  of  kings,  binds  with  shackles  of  arbitrary  rule 
millions  of  oppressed  subjects.  The  world  is 
beginning  to  learn  the  true  meaning  of  the  wise 
utterance,  Truth  for  authority;  not  authority  for 
Truth.  It  is  beginning  to  learn  that  right  consti- 
tutes true  might,  but  that  ordinarily  might  is  the 
antipode  of  right.  Slavery  is  the  atmosphere  of 
hell.  Bondage  is  the  center  and  circumference  of 
error.     To  be  arbitrarily  dominated  and  ruled  by 


FREEDOM.  I41 

the  idiosyncracics  and  perversities  of  a  ruling  na- 
ture is  practically  synonymous  with  being  a  mem- 
ber of  the  devil's  chain  gang,  whose  keeper  and 
scourge  can  be  well  named  tyranny  and  false  gov- 
ernment. 

The  higher  forms  of  slavery  remain  in  our  age 
as  remnants  of  the  general  element  of  slavery  not 
yet  fully  destroyed  in  human  consciousness.  Bond- 
age to  evil  thoughts  and  habits  is  abject  slavery. 
There  is  no  tyranny  so  arbitrary  as  that  of  temper, 
appetite,  passion  and  traditional  belief.  These 
elements  are  natural  enemies  to  happiness,  peace 
of  mind,  and  individual  liberty.  The  essential 
cause  of  all  conditions  of  slavery  is  resident  in  the 
human  mind.  Every  thought  must  be  manfully 
met  and  overcome.  Man  ceases  to  be  a  slave  in 
the  degree  that  he  becomes  free.  Deliverance 
from  bondage  does  not  come  as  much  through 
protracted  conflict  with  enslaving  tendencies  as 
through  the  normal  acquisition  of  freedom-bringing 
cnaracteristics.  As  the  mind  acquires  the  health- 
giving     and    joy-bringing    characteristics    of    the 


142  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

higher  selfhood  of  man,  it  naturally  progresses  out 
of  serfdom  into  the  liberty  of  the  children  of  God, 
the  freedom  vouchsafed  to  the  ideas  of  Good. 
The  human  mind  enslaves  itself.  It  pays  tribute 
where  no  tribute  is  due.  It  worships  at  false 
shrines  and  offers  up  costly  sacrifices  to  its  own 
personality  on  altars  of  worldly  policy  and  ambi- 
tious motive.  The  human  mind  perpetuates  its 
own  bondage,  strengthens  the  despotism  of  its  own 
self-will,  and  generally  works  against  its  own  best 
interests.  Protracted  discord,  mental  anguish  and 
bodily  pain  finally  arouse  it  to  a  realizing  con- 
sciousness of  its  slavery-begetting  habits,  moods, 
and  procedure.  The  purification  of  mind  through 
the  accession  of  spirituality  ennobles  the  whole 
nature,  eliminates  harmful  mental  elements  and 
brings  to  the  mind  and  character  the  divine  stim- 
ulus of  natural  and  divine  being  whose  Principle 
and  only  law  is  God,  —  the  universal  and  under- 
lying Perfection,  creative,  all-sustaining,  all-govern- 
ing, omniscient  and  omnipresent. 

In  the  days  of  human  slavery  many  born  in 


FREEDOM.  143 

this  state,  apart  from  the  natural  instincts  resident 
in  every  human  heart,  accepted  slavery  and  the 
fact  of  being  owned  as  one  of  the  inevitable  condi- 
tions of  existence.     While  the  enslaved  individual 
could   never  reconcile  itself    to  the   institution   as 
either  divinely  ordained  or  humanly  just,  yet  hope 
dared  not  rise  to  altitudes  of  optimism  in  regards 
to  freedom.      Enforced  slavery  of    long  duration 
always  tends  to  the  degradation  of  mentality.     In 
many  instances  it  ends  in  virtual  depravity  and  a 
conspicuous  loss  of  individual  integrity  and  power. 
He  who  is  governed  by  the  perpetual  fears  of  bod- 
ily disease  and  death   is  a  slave.     Minds  unduly 
influenced  by  popular  superstitions,  signs,  and  the 
thousand  and  one  fallacies  of  everyday  existence 
are  abject  slaves.     Minds  that  seek  to  do  right  be- 
cause of  fear  of  hell  and  future  punishment  are  in 
one  of  the  worst  forms  of  slavery.      The   careful 
student  of  humanity  is  well   acquainted  with   the 
dogmatic  and  creedal  slave,  the  ecclesiastical  and 
ceremonial    slave,   the   superstitious  and    mystical 
slave.   The  observer  of  the  times  is  well  acquainted 


144  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

with  the  vast  army  of  people  enslaved  by  ignorant 
and  credulous  faith  in  certain  patent  medicines, 
household  remedies,  hygienic  forms  of  treatment, 
mud-baths,  chestnuts  in  pockets,  pewter  finger 
rings,  favorite  prescriptions,  attenuated  poisons;  the 
impartial  medical  observer  is  acquainted  with  the 
great  mass  in  bondage  to  certain  traditional  super- 
stitions concerning  the  invariable  efficacy  of  certain 
drugs,  the  certain  results  of  definite  surgical  opera- 
tions, blind  faith  in  the  family  physician  or  the 
specialist.  Perhaps  the  worst  form  of  mental  slav- 
ery in  existence  is  that  type  of  despotic  bondage 
which  binds  the  hearts  and  minds  of  men  to  the 
unholy  and  savage  idea  of  a  God  of  vengeance, 
who  builds  character  by  sending  disease,  catas- 
trophe, and  discord,  or  through  the  operation  of 
what  may  well  be  called  infinite  chaos.  These 
beliefs,  superstitions,  and  fallacious  theories  are 
one  and  all  chief  causes  in  the  perpetuation  of 
mental  slavery.  The  presence  of  these  miasmic 
germs  in  the  atmosphere  of  thought  cripple  the 
mental   faculties,   enslave   the  mind    and    limit  its 


FREEDOM.  145 

view  of  the  horizon.  They  evolve  and  perpetuate 
the  hell  of  doubt,  scepticism,  materialism,  and 
superstition.  They  obstruct  individual  progress, 
impede  the  advancement  of  the  race,  lengthen  the 
days  of  misery  and  shorten  the  years  of  happiness. 
They  beget  all  manner  of  diseases  of  the  mind  and 
body;  they  create  the  great  mental  strife  of  dual- 
ism in  which  Good  and  evil,  Mind  and  matter,  nar- 
mony  and  discord  seem  ever  at  war. 

Slavery  to  any  one  unnatural,  abnormal,  un- 
true, false  idea  is  the  first  step  toward  mental  and 
moral  degeneration  and  ultimate  materialism.  As 
fear  is  the  absence  of  the  love  which  includes 
peace,  so  slavery  is  the  opposite  of  mental  and 
physical  freedom,  which  contains  within  itself  the 
very  essence  of  harmonious  being.  Perhaps  those 
who  are  slaves  to  the  hallucinations  and  night- 
mares of  groundless  fear,  fearful  of  dangers  that 
have  no  existence,  and  of  woes  that  are  purely 
superstitious,  are  after  all  in  the  worst  prison.  It 
is  well  to  remember  that  the  fear  ot  ill  invariably 
exceeds  the  ill  that  is  feared. 


146  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

It  means  much  to  be  free.  Freedom  is  a  pro- 
gressive state.  Its  fullness  is  not  attained  by  a 
single  step  or  action.  As  long  as  the  human  mind 
exists  and  the  symmetry  of  divinity  is  but  partially 
possessed  by  individuals  there  will  be  states  and 
stages  of  freedom  accompanied  by  states  and 
stages  of  slavery  to  either  fear  or  false  sense. 
Progress  Godvvard  means  advancement  Heaven- 
ward. This  infinite  kingdom,  this  realm  of  bliss 
and  individual  perfection  exists  in  all  the  glory  of 
celestial  being  within  the  individual.  Hence  the 
words  of  Jesus  Christ,  "The  kingdom  of  God  Com- 
eth not  with  observation :  neither  shall  they  say, 
Lo  here !  or,  Lo  there !  for,  behold,  the  kingdom 
of  God  is  within  you."  Mental  freedom  gives  to 
the  mind  perspicuity,  breadth,  discernment,  power, 
intelligence,  patience,  understanding,  courage  and 
peace.  Mental  freedom  allows  the  individual  to 
practically  live,  move,  and  have  his  being  in  God, 
Good.  Life  unhampered  and  unfettered  naturally 
and  instinctively  blends  with  its  creator,  gradually 
attains  unto  the  harmony  of  divine  being,  blends 


FREEDOM.  H7 

with  the  music  of  the  spheres,  enters  consciously 
into  dominion  over  all  lesser  conditions,  and  day 
by  day  awakens  in  the  divine  image  and  likeness 
of  the  eternal  Perfection.  Mental  freedom  is  indis- 
pensable to  right  living.  The  eternal  law  of  indi- 
vidualism precludes  the  possibility  of  one  individ- 
ual being  governed  by  another.  Personality  is 
essentially  a  mask,  that  which  hides  the  real  char- 
acter or  individuality.  It  is  the  to-be-destroyed 
human  sense  asserting  false  claims  and  rights, 
plausible  on  the  surface,  but  at  heart  the  worst 
enemy  to  the  interests  of  the  individual.  Among 
the  many  forms  of  slavery,  perhaps  the  most  subtle 
and  occult,  are  those  phases  of  it  which  tend  to 
keep  an  individual  in  bondage  to  the  personal 
domination  of  a  naturally  ruling  temperament 
under  the  guise  of  gratitude,  obligation,  and  duty. 
In  dealing  with  this  type  of  serfdom  and  unlawful 
control  a  thorough  knowledge  of  temperamental 
characteristics  and  practical  thought-science  is 
most  necessary.  The  human  mind  is  in  itself 
plastic   and   readily   moulded.      Mental   influences, 


148  STUDIES    IN   CHARACTER. 

suggestions,  and  thoughts  silently  imparted  are  as 
yet  little  understood.  The  popular  ignorance  sur- 
rounding this  great  unexplored  realm  is  truly 
astonishing.  For  generations  scholars  and  stu- 
dents have  spent  all  their  time  in  becoming  expert 
physicists  and  masters  of  physical  conditions,  and 
at  the  same  time  have  almost  wholly  ignored  the 
great  world  of  causative  action  wherein  abides  the 
solution  of  all  mental  and  physical  being.  Slavery 
in  its  subtler  guises  takes  on  many  a  cloak.  The 
frank,  sincere,  and  unselfish  natures  are  oftenest 
unconsciously  brought  into  the  helpless  bondage 
of  this  form  of  slavery.  In  many  of  its  aspects  it 
quite  exceeds  in  pathos  and  awfulness  every  other 
form  of  human  slavery.  It  holds  unchallenged 
rule  where  one  least  expects  to  find  it.  It  flour 
ishes  within  the  portals  of  many  a  home  and 
environment  wholly  unknown  to  those  who  enter 
its  precincts.  It  respects  neither  age  nor  worth, 
sex  nor  sensitive  nature,  but  bends  all  to  its  own 
self-perpetuation.  Many  hearts  alone  with  their 
grief,  heroes  and  heroines  unknown  to  the  world, 


FREEDOM.  149 

yea,  unknown  oftentimes  to  their  nearest  and  clos- 
est friends,  are  wearing  away  tired  years  of  servi- 
tude to  the  subtle,  diabolical,  and  inhuman  systems 
of  slavery.  Earth's  unknown  martyrs  are  legion. 
Her  unheard-of  reformers  can  be  counted  by  the 
thousands.  Her  unselfish,  prayerful,  conscientious 
ministers  constitute  an  army  greater  than  any  ever 
visible  to  the  eye  of  man.  Only  a  small  part  of 
the  universal  tragedy  of  human  existence  is  visible 
to  the  world's  onlookers.  The  masses  are  gener- 
ally well  acquainted  with  the  plot  as  a  whole,  but 
in  many  instances  the  details  of  the  drama,  its  true 
setting  and  characteristics,  are  forever  hidden  from 
view  save  to  the  heart  called  upon  to  bear  its  bur- 
dens, perhaps  unknown  to  all  but  the  Heavenly 
Father.  And  what  is  the  basis,  the  center  and 
circumference,  the  real  animus  of  this  subtle  form 
of  mental  slavery,  which  as  a  valley-fog  chills 
every  nature  unfortunate  enough  to  enter  its  net? 
Nothing  more  nor  less  than  the  pride  of  power  anJ 
the  lust  and  greed  of  personal  rulership. 


LIBERTY. 

Where  the  spirit  of  the  Lord  is,  there  is  liberty. 

Freedom  represents  man's  highest  estate. 
That  ascending  human  experience  gives  fore- 
gleams  of  final  emancipation  for  every  individual 
is  abundantly  proved  by  the  testimony  of  all  who 
pass  through  the  refiner's  fire  of  earthly  purifica- 
tion and  progress. 

Where  the  spirit  or  essence  of  good  is,  there  is 
liberty,  with  all  that  liberty  means,  —  integrity, 
faith,  joy,  understanding,  love,  purity,  honesty, 
health  of  body,  mental  poise,  and  righteousness 
of  living.  These  elements  not  only  represent  the 
fruits  of  the  Spirit,  but  embrace  here  and  now  the 
foundations  of  personal  character,  the  home  and 
the  state.  Well  can  we  say,  the  perpetual,  per- 
sistent longing  for  individual  spiritual  freedom,  and 

150 


LIBERTY.  I  5  I 

for  "the  liberty  of  the  sons  and  daughters  of  God" 
definitely  and  surely  prefigures  the  acquisition  of 
this  liberty. 

"The  spirit  of  the  Lord"  is  not  found  where 
fear,  deceit,  mystery,  fanaticism,  and  strife  reign 
partially  or  wholly.  "The  spirit  of  the  Lord,"  — 
the  nature  of  everlasting  Love,  "tempers  the  wind 
to  the  shorn  lamb"  and  leads  the  sons  and  daugh- 
ters of  earth  heavenward  along  the  paths  of  spirit- 
ual thrift,  mental  activity,  —  the  fruit-bearing  ways 
of  honest  humility  and  enlightened  faith. 

Wherever  "the  spirit  of  the  Lord"  is,  there 
peace  abides,  catholicity  of  faith  governs,  and  the 
mean  and  small  things  of  human  nature  are  taught 
the  necessity  of  self-eviction  from  mind,  to  make 
way  for  the  incoming  tides  of  the  great  ocean  of 
good. 

All  liberty,  whether  physical,  scientific,  intel- 
lectual, moral,  or  spiritual,  is  begotten  of  "the 
spirit  of  the  Lord,"  which  embraces  all  man's  in- 
terests, for  it  is  ever-present  and  universal,  manifest 
not  in  externals,  not  in  beliefs  and  mortal  opinions 


152  STUDIES    IN    CHARACTER. 

surcharged  with  tradition,  mysticism,  and  outward 
form,  but  in  the  garden-land  of  joyous  careers 
wrought  in  textures  of  the  fairest  design,  after  the 
celestial  pattern  of  "His  holy  Mount." 

This  "spirit  of  the  Lord"  soonest  enters  the 
child  heart,  stays  with  him  of  purified  nature, 
lingers  with  him  who  judges  not  his  neighbor, 
inspires  him  who  tramples  egotism  under  foot, 
embraces  him  who  frowns  upon  the  habits  of  criti- 
cism, condemnation,  and  the  personalizing  of  evil, 
and  crowns  him  with  power  from  on  high  who 
loves  God  and  his  brother  with  true  affection, 
loyalty,  and  sincerity. 

At  such  a  hearth-stone  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  the 
peace  of  God  abides,  and  the  angels  of  His  pres- 
ence minister  to  all  who  dwell  there. 


There  love  abides, 

What  else  besides 

Can  make  a  home  a  place 

Fit  for  the  Master's  care, 

Fit  for  the  hearts  that  dare 

Withstand  the  world's  enslaving  war 

Against  the  Spirit's  freemen. 


LIBERTY.  I53 

The  liberty  which  "the  spirit  of  the  Lord"  in- 
cludes and  begets,  knows  no  taint  of  personal  am- 
bition for  place  or  power,  no  enslaving  jealousy, 
hatred,  or  resentment,  which  is  but  evil  for  evil, 
wrong  for  wrong,  or  error  sent  back  in  its  kind  in 
act  or  thought,  instead  of  error  destroyed  through 
the  sending  back  of  its  opposites,  —  goodness, 
kindness,  and  mercy. 

Where  love  is  there  is  fearlessness,  and  true 
fearlessness  is  moral  might.  Timidity,  doubt,  and 
a  halting  indecision,  are  symptoms  of  mental  serv- 
itude to  mortal  task-masters,  else  to  erroneous 
belief. 

"The  spirit  of  the  Lord"  is  expressed  in  tend- 
erness, moderation,  patience,  fairness,  and  sweet- 
toned  earnestness.  It  makes  man  naturally  un- 
selfish rather  than  instinctively  selfish,  and  hallows 
a  life  of  ministry  with  the  God-gifts  of  contentment, 
peace,  and  clear  vision.  The  inspiration  of  this 
spirit  illumines  the  upward  path  of  every  Christian 
man  and  woman,  for  it  is  the  spirit  of  Jesus,  the 
compassion  that  stoops  to  conquer,  the  love  that 


154  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

uplifts,  and  the  spiritual  activity  that  interprets  true 
religion  solely  as  the  spiritual  experience  that  leads 
to  the  worship  of  the  Father  in  spirit  and  in  truth. 

The  liberty  included  in  pure  goodness  ever 
wars  on  and  destroys  every  form  of  license. 
Spiritual  freedom  means  the  supreme  rule  of  the 
immanent  God,  divine  Mind;  thus  it  saps  the 
rootage  of  sin,  ignorance,  sense-domination,  pain, 
disease,  and  mental  woe.  Hence  true  liberty 
means  progressive  exemption  from  sin,  suffering, 
and  disease,  and  a  sure  and  steady  gain  in  the 
understanding  and  possession  of  the  immortal  life 
as  the  mental,  individual  likeness  of  God.  He  who 
is  free  from  worry,  apprehension,  and  the  pangs  of 
guilt,  in  a  degree  possesses  a  foretaste  of  heaven. 

Genuine  optimism  consists  not  in  haughty  in- 
difference to  human  woe  and  the  ravages  of  ag- 
gressive evil,  but  in  a  faith  in  the  supreme  curative 
power  of  good  so  lofty  and  practical  that  it  carries 
with  it  the  power  to  heal  these  errors.  And  this 
optimism  is  a  product  of  the  compassionate,  heal- 
ing, saving  "spirit  of  the  Lord." 


LIBERTY.  155 

The  joyous  liberty  with  which  "the  spirit  of 
the  Lord"  blesses  the  broad-minded  and  kindly- 
natured  man,  disperses  the  earth  clouds  of  morbid 
fault-finding,  mental  depression,  and  pessimism. 
To  be  bound  by  these  despoilers  of  our  individual 
right  and  happiness,  is  to  be  subject  to  the  carnal 
mind,  which  is  defined  as  spiritual  ignorance. 

He  who  learns  the  alphabet  of  spiritual  liberty 
progressively  frees  himself  from  the  serfdom  of 
passion,  uncontrolled  appetite,  desire  for  the  mild 
intoxicants  of  wine  and  tobacco,  and  the  stronger 
intoxicants  of  stupefying  liquor  and  drugs.  These 
higher  aspects  of  freedom  go  to  make  up  the  sum- 
total  of  personal  integrity,  happiness,  Christian 
unity,  and  moral-spiritual  worth.  They  bless  the 
individual  and  the  home,  protect  society,  and  en- 
large the  borders  of  the  general  good  and  the 
public  health.  Men  and  women  who  enjoy  the 
sight  of  suffering  enemies  or  tormented  wrong- 
doers, who  gloat  over  the  actual  detail  of  moral 
punishment  without  a  spark  of  love  in  their  hearts 
for  the  finally  cleansed  and  saved  individual  thus 


156  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

purified  and  taught  the  lesson  of  divine  cause  and 
effect,  are  not  only  strangers  to  the  atmosphere  of 
"the  spirit  of  the  Lord,"  but  they  represent  the 
type  of  mind  that  finds  enjoyment  in  the  doctrine 
of  eternal  torment  and  pleasure  in  the  spectacle  of 
human  or  animal  combat. 

Thus  we  are  led  to  see  that  the  militant  spirit, 
as  Spencer  puts  it,  leads  to  the  re-barbarization  of 
the  human  mentality;  and  brute  force,  military 
ideals,  blind  obedience,  and  mental  despotism  take 
the  place  in  human  life,  of  the  spiritual  impulse  of 
the  man  of  Nazareth. 

To  guard  one's  self  from  being  merged  in  an- 
other's mentality,  point  of  view,  or  methods,  to 
think  one's  own  way  out  of  error  into  Truth, 
helped  by  the  light  of  God  within  and  by  the  reve- 
lations He  has  given  to  His  messengers  in  the  past 
and  in  the  present,  is  to  be  loyal  to  the  freedom- 
law  of  "the  spirit  of  the  Lord." 


THE  DIVINE  VISTAS. 

In  life's  great  round  of  experience  there  is  no 
career  so  insignificant  but  that  has  had  its  Mount 
of  Transfiguration.  The  mountain  heights  of  men- 
tal vision  whose  steeps  have  been  laboriously 
scaled  with  the  aid  of  the  staff  of  experience  offer 
to  the  heart  that  which  it  craves,  and  to  the  long- 
ings that  for  which  they  pray.  How  many  times 
in  life  we  rise  through  experience,  human  loss^ 
silent,  unspoken  woe,  and  the  crucifixion  of  the 
affections  to  some  glorious  summit  of  Heavenly 
vision  and  there  get  an  illuminated  glimpse  of 
divine  vistas  of  the  peace  and  dominion,  freedom 
and  victory  that  is  to  be.  We  live  ages  in  these 
moments.  The  whole  of  life  passes  before  the 
mind's  eye  as  a  quickly  changing  panorama. 
Past,  present,  and  future  are  united  in  a  glorious 
now.     We  touch  the  hem  of  the  garment  of  that 

157 


158  STUDIES   IN    CHARACTER. 

peace  which  passeth  all  human  understanding,  and 
gaze  out  upon  the  divine  vista  as  the  man  of  God 
of  old  looked  into  the  Promised  Land.  How  often 
in  such  moments  the  very  atmosphere  of  Heaven 
surrounds  the  soul  and  we  realize  the  hidden  pur- 
poses of  God.  In  such  moments  we  clearly  dis- 
cern the  intent  of  human  experience  and  suffering 
and  spiritually  discern  the  divine  purposes  made 
manifest  in  spiritual  purgation.  Through  the  logic 
of  events  and  force  of  circumstance  we  rise  at  times 
rapidly  to  the  mountain  heights  of  spiritual  under- 
standing and  perception,  and  gain  glimpses  of  the 
divine  vistas  which  stretch  out  on  all  sides  as  the 
heavens  cover  the  earth.  At  such  periods  of 
spiritual  enlightenment  and  experience  the  mys- 
teries of  the  kingdom  of  Heaven  are  made  known 
to  our  waiting  consciousness.  The  divine  relation- 
ship of  God's  ideas  is  revealed ;  the  universe  of 
God's  creation  is  seen  in  spiritual  perception  and 
the  man  and  woman  of  His  creation  perceived  in 
the  glory  of  sinlessness.  We  wonder  and  marvel, 
and  in  the  greatness  of  our  joy  offer  up  prayers  of 


THE    DIVINE    VISTAS.  1 59 

thanksgiving  to  the  eternal  Love  for  these  fulfil- 
ments of  prophecy,  these  answered  prayers,  and 
now  full-satisfied  affection.  And  then  as  if  with 
the  rapidity  of  a  meteor's  fall  the  scene  changes, 
the  clouds  lower,  and  the  divine  vistas  seem  to  fade 
from  view.  But  the  vision  was  ours.  Yea  in 
reality  is  now  our  own.  But  what  saith  the  Spirit? 
•'Thou  must  now  work  up  to  the  possession  of  the 
vision  as  a  permanent  reality."  The  eternal  Love 
has  lifted  the  curtain ;  the  veil  of  sense  has  been 
dispelled ;  earth's  greater  glory  has  transformed 
the  affections ;  everything  with  which  we  come 
in  contact  now  wears  a  different  aspect.  We  date 
our  new  born  hopes,  now  luminous  with  the  mem- 
ory of  the  mountain  vision,  from  the  time  when 
life  put  on  her  new  garments  for  us.  We  have 
seen,  felt,  and  tasted  the  glories  of  the  eternal  plan, 
and  as  we  are  called  upon  to  labor  side  by  side 
with  the  toilers  in  the  valley  at  the  foot  of  the 
mount  of  vision,  all  burdens  are  made  light,  all 
crosses  radiant,  and  every  earth-load  is  lessened  by 
the  ever-presence  of  the  vision  vouchsafed  to  us. 


l60  STUDIES    IN   CHARACTER. 

We  do  not  look  back  to  it,  but  forward  and  up  to 
it.  It  is  before  us  a  living  reality  and  is  to  be 
sooner  than  we  suspect  again  our  happy  posses- 
sion. And  thus  the  Spirit  saith  unto  the  waiting 
heart  perchance  going  through  its  periods  of  doubt 
and  misgiving  as  to  the  reappearance  of  that 
blessed  and  glorified  vista,  "Wait  thou  on  God. 
That  glimpse  of  thy  divine  estate  waits  for  thee 
and  beckons  thee  onward.  Beside  the  tideless  sea 
stands  the  celestial  city.  The  vision  shall  be  thine. 
Its  grandeur  shall  crown  thy  life  and  to  thee  shall 
come  the  voice  of  the  Father,  '  Well  done,  good 
and  faithful  servant,  enter  thou  into  the  joy  of  thy 
Lord.'  " 


THE  PRICELESS  BIRTHRIGHT. 

As  A  SPRING  can  never  rise  higher  than  its 
source,  so  one  can  never  attain  a  greater  success 
than  he  believes  he  can.  Absolute  confidence  in 
one's  ability  to  succeed  is  an  indispensable  essen- 
tial to  the  highest  achievement.  When  you  have 
found  your  niche,  —  when  you  realize  that  you  are 
working  along  the  line  of  your  strongest  faculties 
instead  of  your  weakest,  —  do  not  allow  anything 
to  divert  you  from  your  choice.  No  matter  what 
difficulties  may  arise,  no  matter  how  much  harder 
than  you  anticipated  your  work  may  be,  do  not 
waver  or  turn  back.  Stand  firm  by  your  choice. 
Remember  that  there  are  times  in  every  career 
when  the  thorns  are  more  plentiful  than  the  roses. 
It  is  at  such  seasons  that  your  manhood  must 
assert  itself,  that  the  strength  of  your  purpose  must 
be  proved.     Do  not,  however  dark  or  discouraging 

161 


1 62  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

the  outlook,  admit  the  possibility  of  defeat.  Set 
your  face  toward  your  goal,  and  stoutly  affirm  and 
reaffirm  your  confidence  in  your  ability  to  succeed. 
This  keeping  one's  self  up  to  the  success  standard, 
and  maintaining,  in  all  its  dignity  and  integrity, 
one's  self-sufficiency  to  accomplish  the  thing 
undertaken,  is  proof  of  a  strong  character.  Never 
permit  any  one  or  anything  to  undermine  your 
self-confidence.  Never  admit  to  yourself,  even  in 
thought,  that  there  may  be  a  possibility  of  your 
failure.  This  constant  affirmation,  this  persistent 
dwelling  upon  the  possible,  or  positive,  phase  of 
success,  and  never  admitting  the  negative,  will  tend 
to  strengthen,  to  render  impregnable,  the  great 
purpose,  the  one  unwavering  aim,  which  brings 
victory.  Many  fail  because  their  self-confidence 
becomes  weak;  they  allow  people  to  inject  doubts 
and  fears  into  their  minds,  until  they  become  un- 
certain of  themselves,  and  ultimately  lose  altogether 
that  buoyant  faith  in  their  ability  to  succeed,  with- 
out which  no  great  thing  ever  was  accomplished. 
What  though  you  are  poor,  or  your  environment 


THE    PRICELESS    BIRTHRIGHT.  1 63 

unfavorable !     These  things  should  incite  you  to 
greater  effort.    Stoutly  deny  the  power  of  adversity 
or  poverty  to   keep  you  down,  constantly  assert 
your  superiority  to  your  environment,  know  that 
you  are  the  master  and   not  the  slave  of  circum- 
stances, and  conditions  will  soon  improve.     This 
assumption  of  power,  this  affirmation  of  belief  in 
your  ability  to  succeed,  the  mental  attitude  which 
claims  success  on  the  highest  plane  as  an  inalien- 
able birthright,  will  strengthen  the  whole  nature, 
and   give  wonderful   power  to  the  combination  of 
faculties  which  doubt,  fear,  and  lack  of  confidence 
undermine.     Many  a  man   has   accomplished   his 
object  by  this  determined  adherence  to  faith  in  his 
ability  to  succeed,  when  everything  but  his  deter- 
mination and  confidence  in  himself  has  been  swept 
away.    One  should  cling  to  this  priceless  birthright 
as  he  would  to  his  honor.     Thoughts  are  forces, 
and  the  constant  affirmation  of  one's  inherent  right 
and   power  to  succeed  will   soon  change  inhospit- 
able  conditions    and    unkind    environments    into 
favorable  paths  to  success  and  happiness. 


THE  ABIDING  PRESENCE 
OF  CHRIST. 

LOOKING  backward  down  the  vista  of  time, 
till  thought  rests  with  mingled  awe  and  joy  upon 
the  central  event  of  all  history,  the  first  Christmas, 
with  its  accompanying  message  of  holy  peace  to 
all  men,  does  not  one  overshadowing  question  pre- 
sent itself  to  all  who  thus  journey  back  through  the 
centuries,  to  consider  and  ponder  the  deep  lessons 
taught  by  the  nativity  of  the  Virgin-born  babe  of 
Bethlehem?  Of  what  present  and  individual  signif- 
icance is  this  event  to  me?  Is  its  import  simply 
historical,  or  is  its  essence  spiritual  and  of  hourly 
value  to  me  as  a  child  of  God? 

Prophesied  by  the  seers  of  Hebrew  history, 
and  appearing  in  the  divine  order  of  spiritual  un- 
folding, "  He  came  unto  his  own  and  his  own  re- 
ceived him  not." 

164 


THE    ABIDING    PRESENCE    OF    CHRIST.       l6$ 

By  men,  he  was  first  seen  as  a  babe  in  the 
manger  of  humility  and  lowly  estate,  at  twelve  he 
was  able  to  question  the  scholastics  in  the  temple 
at  Jerusalem,  later,  a  carpenter  or  builder  prepar- 
ing to  enter  the  arena  of  human  affairs,  that  he 
might  teach  men  the  science  of  being,  the  building 
of  heavenly  character  "after  the  pattern  shown  in 
the  Mount,"  and  finally,  "the  Light  of  the  world," 
the  great  Victor  over  sin,  disease  and  death. 

To  the  world  of  sense,  Jesus  the  Christ  was 
born,  and  to  awakened  humanity  became  the  divine 
mediator  and  elder  brother.  To  none  save  those 
who  saw  in  him  the  "hope  of  salvation,"  and  the 
Son  of  the  Highest,  did  he  become  the  Messiah  or 
Saviour.  Are  there  not  millions  to-day  who  wor- 
ship and  believe  in  the  historical  Christ  Jesus,  yet 
who  understand  not  the  spiritual  ever-presence  of 
the  enduring  Christ?  How  empty  is  mere  histor- 
ical worship,  and  how  crude  and  infantile  the  pop- 
ular conception  of  the  universality  of  Christ's 
words  and  promises. 

The  abiding  nativity  or  birth  of  the  Christ  con- 


1 66  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

sciousness  must  go  on  hourly  in  the  hearts  of  men, 
else  the  true  import  of  that  great  revelation  of 
sinless  humanhood,  purity,  and  immortality,  is  lost 
The  heavenly  lesson  taught  by  that  distant  Christ- 
mas-tide lives  for  men  to-day,  as  truly  as  it  did  for 
those  humble  pastoral  watchers,  who  heard  the 
first  vesper  song  on  Judea's  plains,  when  through 
the  evening  hush  and  quiet,  rung  out  the  great 
anthem,  "On  earth  peace,  good  will  toward  men." 

It  lives  for  all  who  learn  the  nature  of  that 
peace  that  our  Master  came  to  bring. 

He,  himself  said,  "My  peace  I  give  unto  you," 
and  again,  "I  came  not  to  send  peace,  but  a 
sword."  Christ,  Truth  gives  peace  only  as  it  de- 
stroys the  erring  thoughts  of  the  human  mind,  and 
mortal  selfhood,  i.e.,  materialism.  To  whom  did 
Jesus  bring  peace?  Surely  not  to  the  Scribes  and 
Pharisees,  neither  to  the  rich  ruler,  nor  to  the  man 
who  would  bury  his  father  before  leaving  all  for 
Christ,  nor  to  the  money  changers,  those  who 
loved  to  indulge  in  the  pleasures  of  materialistic 
living,  nor  to  Judas.     To  each  and  to  all  of  these 


THE    ABIDING    PRESENCE    OF    CHRIST.       167 

did   not  his  words   and    life   act   as  a  two-edged 
sword? 

But  to  the  patient  Magdalene,  and  the  sorrow- 
ing families  of  Lazarus  and  Jairus,  to  the  fisher- 
men, who  willingly  left  their  nets  to  follow  him,  to 
the  sorrowful  Peter,  and  to  all  sincere  seekers  for 
"the  mystery  of  Godliness,"  did  not  his  teachings 
and  deeds  mean  that  peace,  which  passeth  all 
human  understanding,  that  rest  for  which  the 
hearts  of  men  ever  yearn,  and  that  elevation  above 
earthly  living,  for  which  men  in  all  ages  have 
sought?  Truly  is  this  Christ-given  peace  a  fore- 
taste of  what  the  Psalmist  calls  "the  secret  place 
of  the  Most  High,"  the  infinite  calm  of  Spirit.  It 
means  that  men  can  be  strong  and  restful  in  the 
spiritual  thought,  even  amid  the  discords  of  earth, 
and  that  man  can,  in  Goldsmith's  words,  be 


"As  some  tall  cliff,  that  lifts  its  awful  form; 
Swells  from  the  vale  and  midway  leaves  the  storm, 
Though  round  its  breast  the  rolling  clouds  are  spread, 
Eternal  sunshine  settles  on  its  head." 


Not  to  those  who   simply   bow    the    corporal 


1 68  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

knee  at  the  name  of  Jesus,  amidst  the  elegance 
of  ritualistic  worship  and  ecclesiasticism ;  not  to 
those  whose  lips  praise  God,  while  their  hearts 
(thoughts),  are  far  from  Him,  nor  to  those  who 
deny  the  lasting  importance  of  the  Master's  com- 
mand, to  all  men,  in  all  ages,  "preach  the  gospel, 
heal  the  sick,"  will  Christ  bring  peace,  but  a 
sword.  "If  ye  love  me  keep  my  commandments" 
is  the  keynote  of  Christian  obedience,  and  nothing 
short  of  Christian  obedience,  and  nothing  short  of 
absolute  regard  for  all  his  commands  can  be 
termed  true  worship,  or  love  of  God.  Our  Master, 
majestic  in  meekness,  radiated  love  and  purity. 
He  solved  life's  problem  in  accord  with  the 
divinely  scientific  law,  tore  the  shroud  of  mys- 
tery from  the  minds  of  men,  revealed  the  celestial 
peaks  of  the  mountains  of  holiness,  healed  sin  and 
disease  with  spiritual  law,  ushered  men  into  the 
very  streets  of  heaven  while  still  on  earth,  taught 
the  universal  salvation  of  all  men  from  evil,  dis- 
cord, and  death,  comforted  the  sorrowing,  strength- 
ened the  earth-laden,  and  carried  his  demonstra- 


THE    ABIDING    PRESENCE    OF    CHRIST.       169 

tions  to  the  very  zenith  in  his  resurrection  and 
ascension.  He  revealed  Science  as  divine,  the 
falsely  called  supernatural  as  pre-eminently  natural, 
acquainted  man  with  his  heavenly  Parent,  and 
illumined  the  leaden  sky  of  doubt  and  spiritual 
penury,  with  the  divine  practicability  of  the 
parental  government  of  omnipotent  Love. 

Thus  learning,  that  as  the  Bethlehem  babe 
grew  and  waxed  strong,  so  must  this  same  Christ- 
Mind  become  our  all  and  only  consciousness,  then, 
and  then  only,  will  the  nativity  of  Christ  be  an 
abiding  guest  in  the  house  of  our  thoughts  and 
lives. 

When  in  the  hush  of  Soul,  we  hear  the  gentle 
voice  of  the  ever-present  Christ  speaking  in  its  oft- 
repeated  words,  "Behold  !  I  stand  at  the  door  and 
knock,"  let  us  answer  in  the  words  of  Samuel, 
"speak,  Lord,  for  thy  servant  heareth," — enter 
thou  my  life  and  go  not  out  forever. 


GOD'S  DAYLIGHT. 

THE  day  declineth  and  the  shadows  of  the 
approaching  twilight  are  fast  falling  over  the  bay 
of  silvery  blue,  the  great  tide  which  for  six  hours 
has  moved  inward  from  the  Atlantic  now  pauses 
for  its  half  hour  of  peaceful  rest  before  it  begins  its 
eastern  journey  to  the  ocean  from  which  it  came. 
At  this  hour  it  knows  neither  flow  nor  ebb  but 
rests  in  majestic  peace  as  nature's  tideless  sea. 
The  vesper  song  of  the  birds  is  heard  on  every 
side,  all  nature  is  in  tune  with  the  infinite,  her 
mood  expresses  the  hush  and  calm  of  the  ap- 
proaching evening  hour,  the  day's  work  is  ended, 
the  returning  herds  come  up  from  the  woodland 
valleys  and  from  the  rugged  hills  to  the  place  of 
milking,  the  hum  of  insects  partakes  of  the  in- 
creasing quiet  of  the  gloaming,  and  the  brilliant 
glory  of  the  sun  now  merges  into  exquisite  blend- 

170 


GODS    DAYLIGHT.  1 7  I 

ings  of  color,  dark  gray  merging  into  lighter 
shades,  then  into  the  deep  far  away  blue  of  the 
firmament,  while  over  all  is  thrown  as  a  transparent 
veil  the  graduated  tints  and  shades  of  cardinal  and 
ruby  red.  The  distant  driving  clouds  receive  the 
reflection  of  these  tints  and  send  back  a  glory  like 
unto  that  on  the  near  horizon,  but  with  the  added 
charm  of  distant  color.  In  every  direction  nature's 
music  voices  the  infinite  calm  of  Spirit  and  the 
peaceful  bay  answers  back  this  symphony  of  the 
overbrooding  love,  "at  evening  time  it  shall  be 
light."  Like  unto  the  silence  of  soul  that  prefaces 
the  audible  voice  of  prayer  of  thanksgiving,  so  this 
hour  prefigures  the  approaching  glory  of  the  celes- 
tial city  beside  the  tideless  sea,  the  true  abiding 
place  of  man,  at  one  in  the  infinite  All.  The  twi- 
light deepens,  the  song  of  the  woodland  birds  be- 
comes more  and  more  remote  and  indistinct,  as  if 
by  common  consent  they  too  blend  with  the  ap- 
proaching night  and  rest  from  their  labors,  yea 
pass  from  the  joy  that  is  heard  to  that  which  is 
silently  felt.    The  tide  now  sweeps  by  to  the  ocean, 


172  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

carrying  with  it  its  freightage  of  driftwood  and 
seaweed,  current  crosses  current  and  eddy  meets 
eddy,  yet  the  one  great  main  movement  is  toward 
the  ocean  and  carries  with  it  everything  not 
anchored.  The  twilight  hour  deepens  into  night, 
the  afterglow  of  the  sunset  of  peace  now  speaks  its 
prophecy  of  a  deeper  calm  and  a  fuller  rest  to  all 
nature's  creatures:  the  silence  of  Spirit  encom- 
passeth  all  things.  Trees,  rocks,  horizon,  fields, 
meadows,  mountains  and  bay  now  lose  all  identity 
of  outline,  color,  form,  and  individuality,  and 
the  garments  of  the  night  studded  with  the 
precious  stones  of  light,  which  like  jewels  shine 
forth  from  the  eternal  firmament,  wrap  all  in  a 
shroud  of  darkness,  and  yet  the  stars  tell  of  the 
everpresent  light,  and  the  midnight  hour  glorious 
in  the  majesty  of  its  quietude  is  in  itself  a  prophecy 
of  the  new  day  coming.  My  soul  hungering  and 
thirsting  after  righteousness  seeks  the  light  of  the 
countenance  of  Him  who  is  Light.  Alone  with 
God  the  heart  is  one  with  its  Creator,  it  mounts  as 
if  on  wings  of  eagles.     But  listen  !     There  is  argu- 


GODS    DAYLIGHT.  1 73 

ment  but  no  voice  speaketh.  There  is  fear  but  no 
man  harmeth.  There  is  doubt  but  no  voice  op- 
poseth.  There  is  yearning  yet  no  unpossessed 
glory  is  visible.  There  is  timidity  yet  no  beast 
prowleth  nigh  and  no  lion  roareth.  A  moment  of 
hope  and  the  mists  of  sense  seem  to  obscure  even 
the  glory  of  the  surrounding  calm,  but  the  heart 
still  faces  the  light  with  the  loyalty  of  pure  con- 
stancy, clings  to  the  lesson  of  the  everpresent 
Ideal,  who  governeth  all  things  in  righteousness, 
perfection  and  purity.  The  midnight  hour's  holy 
calm  bears  silent,  almost  pitiful,  witness  to  the 
Jacob  struggle,  with  what?  With  the  belief  that 
nothing  is  something.  But  amidst  the  misgivings 
of  the  human  heart  soundeth  the  first  far  off  and 
sweet  music  of  the  daylight  of  God's  Allness. 
Amid  the  surrounding  darkness  there  appears  the 
first  faint  suggestion  of  the  new  day.  God's  day- 
light has  already  begun  its  inauguration  of  calm 
within  the  heart,  the  Red  Sea  of  mental  conflict  is 
past,  the  dry  land  of  spiritual  victory  is  firmly  trod 
with  feet  shod  with  sandals  of  spiritual  aspiration 


174  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

and  purity's  certainty.  The  morning  breaketh. 
From  one  direction  and  then  from  another  and 
another  come  the  first  faint  notes  of  nature's  love 
concert.  The  morning  birds  already  herald  the 
new  day ;  harbingers  of  love  and  forerunners  of 
light,  they  speak  to  the  heart  their  "Peace  be  still," 
and  tell  on  the  ascending  note  of  audible  joy  their 
divine  message  of  Love's  new  order.  Once  more 
the  great  tide  is  still.  Its  ebb  and  flow  are  past. 
It  resteth  awhile.  The  rising  orb  of  day  illumines 
the  eastern  heavens  with  the  same  colors  that  in 
stately  procession  and  divine  order  accompanied  it 
at  the  sunset  hour  only  a  few  hours  ago.  Again 
trees  and  hills,  mountains  and  valleys,  bay  and 
islands,  flowers  and  nature's  hosts  come  to  the 
vision  of  the  eye  in  all  the  grandeur  of  the  infant 
day.  The  heart  conscious  only  of  the  peace  of 
night  forgets  all  struggle,  fear,  timidity,  doubt; 
knows  its  kingly  origin  and  divine  nature,  and  is  at 
peace  filled  with  the  glory  of  the  Lord.  The  day- 
light increaseth,  the  shadows  flee,  the  rising  sun 
sheds  its  brghtness  over  all,  joyous  are  the  birds, 


god's  daylight.  175 

glistening  with  diamonds  of  dew,  the  grass  meekly 
offers  itself  to  the  cattle.  Again  the  music  of  the 
cowbells  is  heard,  as  through  the  lanes  and  fields 
the  herds  wend  their  way  to  the  pastures,  and  all 
nature  goeth  on  its  way  rejoicing.  The  laborer  in 
the  fields,  and  bird  and  flower,  insect  and  animal, 
man  and  woman,  know  that  the  Love  that  is  God 
encircles  as  the  atmosphere,  brightens  as  the  sun- 
shine, waters  the  earth  as  the  falling  rain. 


THE  LIBERAL  CHRISTIAN. 

That  man  is  liberal  who  stands  with  face 
toward  the  rising  sun  of  Truth  wheresoever  it 
riseth,  and  who  joyously  drinks  in  the  inspiration 
of  the  higher  life  fresh  from  the  Over-Soul  of 
Good.  Such  a  man  lives,  progresses,  and  mounts 
up  "with  wings  as  eagles"  and  never  for  an  instant 
thinks  that  the  Sun  of  Truth  has  as  yet  reached 
the  full  noon  of  complete  understanding  and  real" 
ization  by  man. 

That  man  is  liberal  who  depends  more  upon 
the  unfolding  of  the  divine  within  his  own  chastened 
heart  and  purified  mind,  than  upon  the  opinions  of 
men,  the  doctrines  of  creeds,  scholastic  speculation 
and  so-called  churchly  decrees.  He  delights  to 
commune  with  the  Christ-spirit,  and  puts  principle 
above  personality,  spirit  above  creed,  right  above 

176 


THE    LIBERAL    CHRISTIAN.  1 77 

party,  and  inward  conviction  above  outward  sense 
evidence. 

That  man  is  liberal  who  accords  to  all  men  the 
same  privileges  of  thought  and  action  that  he  con- 
tends for  as  the  essential  liberties  and  rights  of  his 
own  individuality,  and  who  is  judicious  and  toler- 
ant, yet  clear  and  sure,  in  his  judgments,  whether 
they  be  private  in  the  secret  court  of  his  unspoken 
conclusions,  or  public,  as  spoken  admonition  or 
condemnation. 

The  man  is  liberal  who  recognizes  that  the 
experiences  of  human  life,  which  point  by  point 
show  the  false  and  temporal  nature  of  all  things 
evil  and  material,  are  the  different  educational 
courses  of  progress  in  the  great  University  of 
earthly  experience,  and  who  learns  to  draw  from 
these  deep  lessons  of  life  the  true  import  of  their 
significance  as  the  birth-throes  of  the  life  divine. 

That  man  can  be  called  liberal  who  learns  truth 
from  all  things,  both  great  and  small,  from  babes 
and  sages,  youth  and  age,  birds  and  stars,  flowers 
and  animals,  sunshine  and  shadow;   and  who  can 


178  STUDIES   IN    CHARACTER. 

as  readily  and  humbly  learn  from  the  lowly,  as 
himself  teach  the  multitude  that  may  willingly  sit 
at  his  feet  and  bow  before  his  wisdom. 

That  man  is  liberal  whose  love  to  God  and 
man  makes  Christly  character  the  great  test  of 
discipleship,  who  loves  truth,  Principle,  and  good 
for  their  own  sake,  and  who  spurns  fear  in  religion 
as  an  unworthy  element,  seeing  in  it  a  menace  to 

the  pure  and  undefiled  love  of  God.  Such  a  man 
is  noble  because  of  his  love  for  those  character- 
istics that  make  up  true  nobility,  and  his  founda- 
tion is  of  rock  and  not  of  shifting  sand. 

That  man  is  called  liberal  whose  heart  rejects 
the  blind  tyranny  of  fashion,  habit,  custom,  and 
so-called  public  opinion,  once  named  by  a  great 
thinker,  "a  conscience  owned  by  a  syndicate"; 
and  he  is  truly  liberal  who  has  the  courage  of  his 
convictions  and  who  will  speak  and  act  for  them  as 
sincerely  and  radically  in  the  arena  of  public  criti- 
cism, censure,  and  abuse,  as  amidst  the  approving 
silence  of  his  own  breast  or  the  plaudits  of  the 
multitudes. 


THE    LIBERAL    CHRISTIAN.  1 79 

Truly  liberal  is  he  who  adopts  a  liberal  religion, 
and  sees  in  all  things  God's  generous  and  liberal 
plan  of  salvation  for  the  world.  Such  an  one  rec- 
ognizes that  the  ever-presence  of  God,  together 
with  Love's  omnipotence,  makes  scientifically  cer- 
tain the  important  fact  that  divine  Mind  enters  as 
supreme  into  every  state  of  life,  and  is  the  God 
who  forgiveth  (destroyeth)  all  our  iniquities,  and 
also  in  the  words  of  the  psalmist,  "healeth  all  our 
diseases,"  for  God  is  all  in  all,  and  "in  Him  we 
live,  and  move,  and  have  our  being." 

That  man  is  truly  liberal  who  makes  a  loving, 
pure,  and  noble  life  his  creed ;  who  sees  in  unself- 
ishness toward  his  fellows  the  true  worship  of  God, 
and  whose  cardinal  aim  in  life  is  to  — 


"Be  to  other  souls  the  cup  of  strength  in  some  great  agony, 

Enkindle  generous  ardor,  feed  pure  love: 

Beget  the  smiles  that  have  no  cruelty, 

Be  the  sweet  presence  of  good  diffused, 

And  in  diffusion  evermore  intense 

So  will  he  join  the  choir  invisible 

Whose  music  is  the  gladness  of  the  world." 

That  man  is  liberal  who  sees  in  endless  pro- 


l80  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

gression  the  radiant  plan  of  God's  eternal  law; 
who  recognizes  that  time,  space,  finite  limitation, 
the  circumscribed  horizon  of  the  human  mind,  and 
the  speculations  of  human  intellect  form  no  real 
part  of  the  eternal  plan  of  infinite  Mind,  whose 
being  is  Love  and  whose  law  maintains  the  indi- 
vidual identity  of  all  things  eternal,  from  glory 
unto  glory. 

It  can  be  well  said  that  the  man  is  liberal  who 
sees  in  the  great  thought  of  immortality  the  scien- 
tific and  sure  birthright  of  every  creature  of  God's 
universe,  whose  faith  in  endless  existence  is  based 
on  the  doctrine  of  the  self-existence  and  eternal 
perpetuity  of  all  that  is  good  and  perfect,  and 
whose  rational  understanding  of  immortality  is 
built  upon  the  granite  foundation  of  the  teaching 
that  Mind  and  Mind's  creations,  both  in  essence 
being  the  very  selfhood  of  life,  truth,  and  good, 
are  forever  eternal,  for — 

"To  Life  there  is  no  death, 
To  love  there  is  no  fear, 
What  was  still  is; 
What  is  shall  be, 


THE    LIBERAL    CHRISTIAN.  l8l 

With  naught  of  change  for  death; 
With  nothing  of  decay." 

That  man  can  be  called  liberal  who  firmly  be- 
lieves in  the  divine  immanence,  whose  faith  in  one 
supreme  being,  —  God,  —  is  so  full,  deep  and  un- 
changing, that  he  thoroughly  disbelieves  in  the 
reality  or  actuality  of  any  seeming  force  or  ele- 
ment which  is  opposed  in  character  or  operation 
to  the  nature  of  the  All-Good. 

Such  a  man  will  see  in  the  spiritual  leadership 
of  Jesus  Christ  a  divine  revelation  of  man's  eternal 
and  progressive  perfection. 

That  man  is  liberal  who  sees  in  the  words  of 
Jesus  Christ  more  than  abstract  transcendentalism, 
who  recognizes  in  his  promises  no  limit  of  follow- 
ing or  time,  and  in  his  commands  to  his  followers 
in  all  ages  no  portion  that  can  be  rejected  as  a 
dead  letter,  or  be  outlawed  because  professing 
Christians  of  all  sects  have  for  centuries  ignored  its 
vital  demands. 

That  man  is  liberal  who,  on  affirming  that  the 
spiritual  is  the  only  real,  has  the  courage  and  con- 


1 82  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

sistency  to  follow  this  recognition  to  its  logical 
conclusion  and  admit  to  the  whole  world,  if  need 
be,  his  disbelief  in  the  divine  reality  of  the  chang- 
ing, chaotic,  and  decaying  phenomena  of  life  visi- 
ble to  the  natural  eye  and  to  the  material  or  per- 
sonal senses. 

That  man  is  truly  liberal  who  halts  not  at  the 
bounds  of  time  and  matter,  nor  at  the  short  span 
of  years  that  make  up  the  average  of  human  exist- 
ence, but  penetrates  beneath  the  surface  of  physi- 
cal life,  and  rising  above  the  fatuous  evidence  of 
the  human  senses  sees  everywhere  present  the 
glorious  evidences  of  the  eternal  divine  Mind, 
whose  thoughts  are  things,  and  whose  creations 
are  visible  to  the  eye  of  the  spiritually  illumined 
mind,  while  they  are  wholly  shut  out  from  the 
vision  of  sense  in  accordance  with  Paul's  words : 
"The  things  which  are  seen  are  temporal,  but  the 
things  which  are  not  seen  are  eternal." 

That  man  can  be  termed  liberal  who  loves  his 
enemies  and  shows  it  in  thought  and  act;  who 
shows  himself  anxious  to  prove  his  foe  in  the  right, 


THE    LIBERAL    CHRISTIAN.  183 

if  this  be  the  fact,  and  always  takes  the  side  of 
liberal  progress,  justice,  and  purity,  even  if  it  be  to 
side  with  an  unpretentious  minority,  or  to  share  a 
crust  for  the  sake  of  a  principle ;  yea  even  to  de- 
part from  the  beaten  pathway  of  the  world's  sages, 
philosophers,  and  popular  teachers,  if  the  honest 
conviction  of  truth  so  demands. 


"  Then   to  side  with  truth   is  noble  when   we  share  her 

wretched  crust, 
Ere  her  Cause  bring  fame  and  profit;  and   'tis  prosperous 

to  be  just; 
Then  it  is  the  brave  man  choses,  while  the  coward  stands 

aside, 
Doubting  in  his  abject  spirit,  till  his  Lord  is  crucified, 
And   the   multitude    make   virtue   of   the   faith    they   had 

denied." 


VICTORY  OVER  FEAR. 

[by  permission.] 

Fear  appears  as  an  assertion  of  being  in  oppo- 
sition to  the  one  great  universal  essence,  divine 
Love.  The  Scriptural  statements  are  therefore 
significant:  God  is  Love.  Whosoever  dwelleth  in 
Love  dwelleth  in  God  and  God  in  him.  Perfect 
love  casteth  out  fear.  Whosoever  feareth  is  not 
made  perfect  in  love. 

Fear  is  the  world's  greatest  slave-holder.  Mon- 
archs  and  peasants,  learned  and  unlearned,  the  old 
and  the  young,  the  civilized  and  the  savage,  all  in 
greater  or  less  degree  yield  temporary  obedience 
to  the  arbitrary  dictates  of  this  most  cruel  of  cruel 
task-masters.  A  mouse  may  stampede  a  whole 
herd  of  elephants.  The  greatest  conquests  of 
human  history  have  not  been  the  much  heralded 
victories  of  nation  over  nation,  army  over  army,  or 

184 


VICTORY    OVER    FEAR.  1 85 

of  man  over  the  forces  of  nature.  Such  triumphs 
may  be  and  have  been  great,  but  there  is  yet  a 
greater  conquest.  This  conquest  is  the  victory 
gained  over  fear  in  the  individual  consciousness 
of  every  human  being.  The  processes  of  man's 
awakening  in  the  divine  image  and  likeness  of  God 
seem  to  be  from  beginning  to  end  a  succession  of 
victories  over  fear,  both  in  the  abstract  and  in  the 
concrete.  Fear  is  both  the  tempter  and  the 
tempted,  the  torment  and  the  tormentor.  Fear  is 
the  world's  torture-chamber  to  which  the  race, 
through  erroneous  belief,  commits  itself.  Individ- 
ual effort,  moral  courage,  and  mental  ascension 
into  oneness  with  the  divine  nature,  reverse  this 
sentence  and  destroy  the  element  of  human  nature 
which  would  lead  every  individual  into  this  place 
of  torment. 

Fear  is  parent  to  such  mentally  debilitating 
moods  as  apprehension,  worry,  timidity,  cowardice, 
depression,  superstition,  self-deprecation,  self-lim- 
itation, and  that  merely  animal  or  fool-hardy  false 
courage,  which  under  stress  will  hazard  the  most 


1 86  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

unnecessary  risks.  Fear  of  suffering  and  of  the 
discipline  consequent  upon  the  infraction  of  moral 
and  spiritual  law  often  begets  dishonesty  of  thought 
and  action.  Hence  fear  is  frequently  the  parent  of 
dishonesty.  Fear  is  little  less  than  atheism.  It  is 
a  mood,  belief,  or  sense  of  things  which  practically 
denies  the  ever-presence  of  God  as  all  Truth,  Life, 
and  Love.  Fear  is  a  component  part  of  the 
Adamic  or  animal  nature ;  a  re-actionary  state  of 
thought  which  is  at  all  times  delusion.  Fear  is  the 
prolific  cause  of  day-ghosts,  and  of  the  nightmares 
of  darkness.  It  has  been  well  said  that  "fear  is 
the  devil's  ablest  representative  agent,  the  child 
most  resembling  the  features  of  its  parent."  Fear 
is  the  intimate  and  congenial  accomplice  of  evil  in 
the  majority  of  the  great  tragedies  of  human  ex- 
perience. 

The  healing,  saving  consciousness  of  the  all- 
Good,  all-Love — God  —  cures  disease,  destroys 
sin,  enthrones  the  contentment  of  peace,  and  anni- 
hilates the  false  claim  of  remembered  or  present 


VICTORY    OVER    FEAR.  1 87 

fear.  This  normal  state  is  heaven's  native  atmos- 
phere. 

The  weak  links  of  the  chain  of  individual 
human  nature  are  the  cardinal  fears  of  that  nature, 
therefore  an  individual's  weak  points  include  his 
leading  fears.  The  conquest  of  these  fears  through 
the  acquisition  of  the  thoughts  of  divine  Mind 
constitutes  the  divine  process  through  which  is 
acquired  the  Mind  of  the  Master  and  the  gradual 
possession  of  immortal  sovereignty. 

Fear  is  a  mood  of  error  that  has  many  sub- 
divisions, and  is  in  human  belief  especially  conta- 
gious. Through  the  long  centuries  of  human 
progress,  fear  has  been  the  chief  weapon  in  the 
hands  of  tyrants.  In  the  ages  past,  fear  rather 
than  love  has  ruled  the  race,  but  the  present  hour 
sees  the  exaltation  of  Love  as  the  supreme  power. 

Fear  will  always  be  found  arguing  for  the  in- 
terests and  victory  of  its  own  proteges,  —  catastro- 
phe, loss,  demoralization,  accident,  defeat,  death. 
Fear  rules  over  a  house  divided  against  itself,  for  it 
is  the  law  of  friction  in  itself  and  ultimately  proves 


1 88  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

the  occasion  of  its  own  destruction.  The  de- 
animalizing  of  the  human  mentality,  and  its  purifi- 
cation through  the  recognition  of  pure  Mind,  leads 
consciousness  by  sure  degrees  into  the  repose  of 
spiritual  activity  wherein  progress  is  painless,  and 
individuality  is  progressively  discovered. 

As  the  history  of  the  individual  is  identical 
with  that  of  the  race  in  its  upward  climbings  from 
sense  to  Soul,  from  the  slavery  of  fear  to  the 
liberty  of  spiritual  fearlessness,  so  the  actual  his- 
tory of  the  mental  struggles  of  the  race  as  a  whole 
is  identical  with  the  history  of  the  individual.  The 
conquest  of  a  sense  of  indefinite  fear  must  be  the 
starting-point  for  our  victory  over  human  limita- 
tion, and  an  innumerable  succession  of  victories 
over  fear  constitutes  the  history  of  every  ascending 
career.  From  earliest  times  tribes,  nations,  and 
peoples,  like  individuals,  have  risen  from  low  to 
high  conditions  by  this  overcoming. 

Fear  does  not  always  define  itself.  At  times  it 
is  without  form  or  argument,  instinctive  and  de- 
pressing.    Under  other  conditions  it  conjures  up 


VICTORY    OVER    FEAR.  1 89 

from  the  dark  chasm  of  materialism,  the  bottom- 
less pit  of  nothingness,  some  mountain-peak  of  de- 
fined catastrophe,  collapse,  or  fatality.  Surrender 
to  what  may  be  denominated  the  fear  mood, 
brings  the  mind  into  the  mental  realm  of  false 
argument,  erroneous  concept,  and  chaos,  and 
effectively  excludes  peace,  courage,  and  happiness. 
A  man's  leading  fear  is  that  man's  personal  devil. 
His  minor  or  lesser  fears  may  be  termed  the  devil's 
satellites.  His  happiness  and  success  are  therefore 
in  his  own  keeping,  and  it  is  largely  his  own  fault 
if  he  is  mentally  hospitable  to  this  devilish  sov- 
ereign and  his  troop. 

Strange  as  it  may  appear,  the  first  tendency  of 
the  human  mind  seems  to  be  to  ascribe  reality  to 
the  unreal.  With  further  analysis  and  thought, 
however,  the  positive  reality  appears,  and  easy 
victory  is  gained  over  the  condition  feared.  At  all 
times  it  should  be  remembered  that  fear  gains  its 
power  over  thought  from  the  fact  that  a  false  sense 
entertained,  argues  for  the  reality  of  the  obnoxious 
unreal.     Fear  is  at  all  times  a  pessimist,  an  enemy 


I90  STUDIES   IN    CHARACTER. 

to  health  and  happiness,  and  a  continued  adver- 
sary to  the  normal  rights  of  the  individual. 

"Be  not  afraid,  only  believe,"  said  the  Master. 
He  who  refuses  to  think  a  fear  thought  and  men- 
tally affirms  Love's  allness,  dwells  secure  in  the 
embrace  of  the  eternal.    Thus  is  salvation  wrought. 

Because  sickness,  mental  and  bodily  discord, 
and  death  menace  the  instinctive  love  of  life,  these 
errors  are  most  feared  by  the  human  mind.  For- 
getful of  the  harmful  effects  of  fear,  this  mind  fails 
to  master  the  deep  philosophy  of  the  Pauline  utter- 
ance, "Know  ye  not,  that  to  whom  ye  yield  your- 
selves servants  to  obey,  his  servants  ye  are  to 
whom  ye  obey."  Throughout  the  ages  the  realm 
of  religious  belief  about  God,  man,  heaven,  hell, 
suffering,  and  individual  salvation,  has  been  more 
invaded  and  ruled  by  the  monster  fear  than  any 
other  department  of  human  thought.  Past  and 
present  religious  thought  relates  largely  to  man's 
future.  Wherever  the  unknown  or  future  tense 
enters  in,  there  fear  will  always  be  found  on  the 
spot,    ready  to    give   a    lurid    description   of   that 


VICTORY    OVER    FEAR.  19I 

which  is  liable  to  happen.  It  has  been  truly  said 
that  "the  fear  of  ill  exceeds  the  ill  we  fear,"  and  it 
is  a  true  statement  which  reads,  "Death  is  the  fear 
of  death." 

Argue  as  we  may,  analyze  as  we  may,  search 
and  penetrate  as  we  may  into  the  farthest  domains 
of  the  enemies  country,  —  thought  comes  back  to 
the  original  proposition  that  the  belief  in  error  is 
error,  as  the  sense  of  sin  is  sin. 

Victory  over  fear  is  not  won  in  a  moment.  We 
are  fearless  and  spiritually  courageous  in  the  ratio 
that  we  are  developed  in  the  understanding  of 
Love,  Spirit,  God,  our  Father-Mother.  Fear  has 
been  analyzed  for  what  it  is  and  what  it  does ;  not 
to  cast  reflection  upon  those  holy  souls  who  are 
nobly  and  bravely  fighting  the  good  fight  of  faith 
and  overcoming  with  surety  and  certainty  this 
common  enemy.  The  fearless  nature  is  neither 
brusque  nor  harsh,  but  honest,  tender,  and  brave. 
Moral  courage  is  moral  because  it  has  the  fearless- 
ness of  morality,  and  is  the  offspring  of  a  limited 
spiritual  understanding  of  the  first  great  command- 


192  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

ment,  "Thou  shalt  have  no  other  gods  before  me." 
Therefore  moral  courage  in  its  higher  sense  is 
spiritual  courage,  and  is  truly  "the  lion  of  the  tribe 
of  Judah."  Men  possessed  with  a  single  idea,  not 
at  all  commendable  or  exalted  in  itself,  often  face 
disease,  catastrophe,  and  death  with  visible  fear- 
lessness, but  these  forms  of  courage  do  not  triumph 
in  the  great  inner  battles  of  life,  or  bring  the  in- 
dividual to  the  realm  of  divine  and  immortal  sov- 
ereignty. The  most  sensitive  and  spiritually  en- 
riched natures  often  tell  us  that  their  lives  are  beset 
with  many  fears  and  their  mental  processes  register 
many  hours  of  silent  conflict  with  self-distrust  and 
timidity.  They  also  tell  us  that  these  conflicts 
steadily  lead  to  places  of  peace,  repose,  mental 
quietude,  and  bodily  health,  where  God's  children 
can  rest  from  their  labors  and  enjoy  the  blessed 
ness  of  dominion,  and  plentitude  here  and  now. 

As  Good,  divine  Love,  and  Truth,  the  syno- 
nymns  of  God,  dwell  forever,  self-conscious  and 
harmonious,  so  man,  the  image  and  likeness  of 
perfect   Being,   is  forever  conscious  of   harmony, 


VICTORY    OVER    FEAR.  1 93 

dominion,  and  immortality.  Eternal  Life  is  pro- 
gressive Life,  and  the  man  of  Us,  even  now  and 
here,  has  dominion  over  sin,  sickness,  and  death, — 
over  fear  and  its  myriad  sub-divisions.  The  con- 
sciousness of  the  allncss  of  divine  Love  as  the 
infinite  guide,  healer,  sustainer,  and  ruler  of  man's 
destiny,  begets  faith,  which  leads  men  to  believe 
all  the  promises  of  the  Most  High,  because  so 
many  of  them  have  already  been  fulfilled  in  dem- 
onstration. 

In  no  one  way  does  fear  show  itself  in  a  more 
pernicious  garb  than  in  its  seeming  power  to  per- 
petuate pain  and  disease.  Physicians  admit  that 
the  most  hideous  diseases  are  engendered  by  fear, 
and  the  severest  form  of  sickness  is  prolonged  by 
its  presence.  Therefore  love  and  faith  as  mental 
conditions  are  of  especial  healing  value.  Where 
fear  is,  love  is  not.  Where  there  is  real  love,  there 
can  be  no  fear.  We  never  really  love  those  whom 
we  fear,  and  the  nature  that  is  fearful  has  not  yet 
tasted  the  bliss  of  true  love,  from  which  the  fear 
element  is  forever  absent. 


194  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

Many  temperaments  are  kept  in  bondage  to 
organized  and  personal  domination  because  their 
fears  are  constantly  played  upon  by  the  particular 
dogmas  of  the  institution  by  which  they  are  en- 
slaved, or  by  the  threats,  arguments,  and  methods 
of  some  controlling  mind.  Slavery  to  duty  is 
often  a  form  of  fetish  worship,  an  attenuated  ex- 
pression of  fear.  The  broad,  hopeful,  generous, 
pure-minded,  and  unselfish  nature  easily  blends 
with  the  love  order  of  the  universe,  and,  conscious 
of  its  own  individual  sovereignty,  makes  of  life  one 
progressive  song  of  triumph  and  well-doing.  Fear 
is  the  habitual  mood  of  tyrants,  and  those  who 
most  control  others  by  playing  upon  their  fears  are 
the  greatest  serfs  to  fear's  despotic  sway.  It  is  a 
true  saying  that  "the  fear  of  the  unknown  and  the 
unlived  future  exceeds  the  fear  of  the  known,  even 
the  fear  of  the  possible  repetition  of  past  suffer- 
ings." Therefore  there  is  an  infinitude  of  value  in 
the  utterance  of  Jesus,  "Sufficient  unto  the  day  is 
the  evil  thereof." 

If  children  are  guided,  restrained,  and  educated 


VICTORY    OVER    FEAR.  1 95 

through  the  sweet,  patient  activities  of  love,  with  a 
proper  recognition  of  the  child's  individual  rights 
of  self-government  when  old  enough  to  enter  into 
their  possession,  this  is  the  Scientific  method.  But 
children  made  to  obey  through  fear  of  punishment 
are  in  constant  terror  of  their  parents,  and  are 
made  haters  of  the  law  of  right  rather  than  lovers 
of  it.  Is  it  unnatural  that  with  the  first  privileges 
of  individuality  a  mental  reaction  against  enforced 
obedience  takes  place?  This  reaction  is  inevitable, 
and  parents  and  guardians  have  themselves  to 
thank  for  their  grave  disappointments  in  connec- 
tion with  those  whom  they  have  labored  to  educate 
in  the  right  way.  Even  animals  respond  to  the 
sweet  influence  of  loving  patience,  and  resent 
severity  and  government  through  fear.  The 
natural  and  normal  love  of  the  good  and  pure 
expresses  our  recognition  of  the  nature  of  infinite 
Principle,  which  is  thus  reflected  more  and  more 
perfectly  in  us ;  whereas  an  enforced  adherence  to 
righteousness    represents    an    abnormal    condition 


196  STUDIES    IN    CHARACTER. 

which   inevitably  leads    to   retrogression   and   col- 
lapse. 

The  jealousy  that  is  born  of  fear  is  curable 
through  the  understanding  of  that  divine  Love 
which  is  at  once  just  and  logical.  An  understand- 
ing of  the  law  of  relationship  between  individuals 
is  in  itself  a  positive  cure  for  what  can  be  called 
jealous  fear,  and  the  love  that  prefers  another's 
good  above  its  own  is  at  all  times  a  destroyer  of 
every  kind  of  jealousy,  so  truly  defined  by  Shake- 
speare as  "the  green-eyed  monster  which  doth 
mock  the  meat  it  feeds  on." 

Moral  cowardice  is  a  form  of  fear  which  shows 
itself  most  conspicuously.  Fear  of  public  opinion, 
censure,  criticism,  and  misunderstanding,  is  a  pro- 
lific cause  of  mental  torture  and  defeat- begetting 
timidity.  Public  opinion  should  not  be  thought- 
lessly or  stupidly  defied.  On  the  other  hand,  it 
should  neither  be  worshipped  nor  blindly  obeyed. 
Public  opinion  is  but  the  aggregate  sense  of  the 
enlightened  masses  on  a  given  question,  person,  or 
thing.    To  the  extent  that  such  opinion  has  a  right 


VICTORY    OVER    FEAR.  1 97 

basis  and  is  made  up  of  accurate  deductions, 
which  lead  to  true  conclusions,  it  should  be  de- 
ferred to  as  a  guiding  influence  in  human  affairs. 
But  he  who  through  fear  of  a  mistaken  public 
opinion  does  less  than  his  duty,  proclaims  half 
truths  where  whole  truths  are  needed,  will  be  pun- 
ished with  many  stripes  for  disobedience  to  the 
heavenly  vision. 

Moral  timidity,  another  of  fear's  proteges,  in- 
culcates the  erroneous  idea  that  tradition,  custom, 
and  usage,  because  hoary  with  age  and  supported 
by  the  multitudes,  should  receive  obedient  defer- 
ence from  the  individual.  Herein  fear  again  comes 
to  the  front  and  endeavors  to  keep  man  enslaved 
to  mere  institutionalism,  or  conventionalism. 

Fear  of  evil  is  the  self-destructive  characteristic 
of  mortal  mind,  yet  evil  is  the  selfhood  of  this 
mind  and,  logically  analyzed,  it  is  afraid  of  itself. 
And  why  should  this  not  be  so,  is  it  not  the  law  of 
annihilation  to  itself?  Therefore  it  fears  itself  as 
its  own  destroyer. 

The  human  mind,  always  ready  for  new  frights 


I98  STUDIES   IN    CHARACTER. 

is  stampeded  at  the  sight  of  our  numerous  modern 
synonyms  for  the  one  evil  which  Jesus  defined  as  a 
lie  without  any  truth  in  it,  and  because  the  modern 
terminology  is  couched  in  scientific  phrases  it  be- 
gins to  yield  itself  to  a  new  reign  of  terror  at  the 
awful  character  of  "the  ghost"  or  "man  of  straw" 
that  it  is  called  upon  to  oppose  and  overcome. 
This  very  mind  would  laugh  at  the  thought  of 
fearing  evil  under  its  Biblical  names,  while  it 
cringes  and  crouches  in  trembling  fear  before  the 
apparent  power  of  this  same  old  lie  under  its  mod- 
ern terminology. 

One  of  the  grandest,  bravest  characters  in  the 
history  of  the  race  is  the  law-giver  and  moral  re- 
former, Moses.  The  moral  standard,  which  is  the 
forever  afterglow  of  this  "man  of  the  Law,"  stands 
as  a  sturdy  bulwark  of  the  highest  good  of  the 
race,  and  in  a  foundational  way  it  made  possible 
the  greater  work  of  humanity's  greatest  spiritual 
Leader  and  Regenerator,  Jesus  Christ,  who  added 
to  his  superb  moral  courage  the  richness  of  spirit- 


VICTORY    OVER    FEAR.  1 99 

ual  courage  and  faith,  making  morality  mental  as 
well  as  physical,  and  leading  thought  and  life 
through  a  spiritual  interpretation  of  the  Law  and 
Prophets  to  the  celestial  glory  of  ultimate  sinless- 
ness.  Moses  and  Jesus  stand  amidst  the  eternal 
ways  of  man's  progress  as  beacon  lights  of  man- 
hood's highest  form  of  fearlessness.  Moses  stands 
for  moral  integrity,  Jesus  for  spiritual  law,  and 
both  witness  to  the  law  of  Spirit,  the  triumph  of 
true  manhood  over  fear  in  all  its  forms.  In  our 
own  age  we  are  privileged  in  the  degree  of  our 
worthiness  and  spirituality  to  participate  in  the 
wondrous  triumphs  of  a  type  of  moral-spiritual 
courage  unique  in  the  annals  of  history. 

When  amidst  our  present  observations  of  the 
world-wide  growth  of  Christian  Science,  its  educa- 
tional and  institutional  extension,  we  pause  and  go 
back  in  thought  to  the  time  when  Mrs.  Eddy  in 
the  human  loneliness  of  her  position  as  Discoverer 
and  Founder  of  Christian  Science,  stood  on  one 
life  platform,  with  virtually  the  whole  world  on  an 
opposite  one,  do  we  not  stand  face  to  face  with  a 


200  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

remarkable  instance  of  woman's  fearless  courage. 
At  that  time  cannot  we  picture  her  as  saying:  — 

Whoso  hath  felt  the  Spirit  of  the  Highest 
Cannot  confound,  nor  doubt  Him,  nor  deny; 

Yea,  with  one  voice,  O  world,  though  thou  deniest, 
Stand  thou  on  one  side  for  on  this  am  I  ? 

And  so  on  through  the  years,  by  utterance,  act, 
and  example,  this  torch-bearer  has  borne  witness 
to  the  Christian  Science  religion  of  love.  "It  re- 
quires courage  to  utter  Truth"  (Science  and 
Health,  p.  97),  and  it  certainly  takes  a  divine 
fearlessness  to  uncover  the  myriad  operations  of 
the  claim  of  evil,  —  the  origin  of  all  human  fear. 
Therefore  is  there  not  visible  in  the  life-work  of 
our  Leader's  history  the  grandest  illustration  of 
womanhood's  progressive  victory  over  fear? 

Finally,  thought  turns  away  from  the  contem- 
plation, of  all  that  is  fearful,  or  that  is  associated  in 
any  way  with  the  element  of  fear,  either  in  the  ab- 
stract or  in  the  concrete,  and  with  attention  fixed 
on  the  eternal  type  of  humanly  divine  character 
revealed  through  Christ  Jesus,  we  behold  as  in  a 


VICTORY    OVER    FEAR.  201 

glass  the  glory  of  the  Lord,  and  are  changed  into 
the  same  image  from  glory  unto  glory,  even  as  by 
the  spirit  of  the  Lord.  The  mind  freed  from  fear, 
purified,  chastened,  and  ennobled  by  the  strength 
gained  in  holy  warfare,  mounts  as  on  wings  of 
eagles,  partakes  of  the  primary  glory  of  Man,  and 
enters  into  sonship  with  God.  All  types  finally 
merge  into  the  Christ  type,  as  the  seven  primary 
colors  make  the  perpetual  chastity  of  white.  Jesus 
prayed  that  all  men  should  be  one  with  the  Father, 
even  as  he  was,  and  that  all  should  with  him  par- 
take of  the  life  celestial.  Therefore  when  fear  pre- 
sents itself  to  the  man  or  to  the  woman  who  would 
be  an  imitator  of  Christ,  when  timidity  projects 
into  human  thought  the  fallacious  argument  of  self- 
limitation,  when  apprehension  would  doom  the 
clear-eyed  vision  of  aspiration  and  spiritual  long- 
ing, when  distrust  of  one's  ability  to  fulfil  the  law 
and  enter  into  the  possession  of  the  promises  of 
Christ  seems  to  eclipse  hope  and  limit  courage, 
let  the  individual  rise  in  the  conscious  strength  of 
God-given   dominion   into   the  eternal  likeness  of 


202  STUDIES   IN   CHARACTER. 

the  all-Perfect.  Let  us  remember  that  the  Father 
of  Jesus  is  still  our  Father,  and  that  as  with  the 
virgin,  our  own  pure  sense,  immaterial  and  super- 
sensual,  still  "doth  magnify  the  Lord."  Let  us  be 
fearless  and  untiring  in  demonstrating  that  the 
pure  in  heart  are  eternally  blessed  because  they 
see  God  in  man  and  in  the  universe,  and  are  for- 
ever the  fearless  children  of  the  eternal  Love. 


POEMS  and  VERSES 

BY   CAROL   NORTON 

CAROL  NORTON'S  poems  possess  a  very  rare 
spiritual  quality.  They  are  graceful  and  sincere 
in  workmanship,  and  frequently  rise  into  unques- 
tioned power.  Mr.  Norton  was  one  of  the  leading  ex- 
ponents of  Christian  Science.  His  poems  will  make  a 
strong  appeal  to  the  followers  of  his  own  faith,  as 
well  as  to  all  who  are  interested  in  the  work  of  a 
young  poet  who  has  both  music  and  message.  Mr. 
Norton  was  related  on  his  mother's  side  to  Henry  W. 
Longfellow,  and  he  shared  with  the  earlier  poet  not 
a  little  of  his  genius  for  melody  in  words,  as  well  as 
his  serene  religious  faith.  The  very  Table  of  Con- 
tents in  "  Poems  and  Verses  "  is  an  inspiration. 
Typical  titles  are  "The  Radiant  Cross,"  "The  Eter- 
nal Hope,"  "  Answered  Prayer,"  "  Be  Fearless,"  and 
"The  End  Is  Light." 

The  mechanical  make-up  of  the  "  Poems  and 
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deckle  edges  and  gilt  top,  and  is  exquisitely  as  well 
as  substantially  bound  in  cloth. 

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A  Novel   of   Well-nigh    Universal   Appeal 

HOLYLAND 

By  GUSTAV   FRENSSEN 

Author  of  "  ybrn  Uhl  " 
Pronounced  by  competent  critics  to  be  the  greatest  novel 
of  modern  times.  The  scenes  and  characters  are  drawn 
from  among  the  humble  seafaring  folk  living  on  the  bor- 
ders of  the  German  Ocean.  Their  life,  love,  and  suffer- 
ing are  wonderfully  shown  and  described.  The  hero 
makes  many  long  sea  voyages,  of  which  the  descriptions 
are  wonderfully  vivid  and  interesting.  Religious  thought 
has  a  large  place  in  the  work,  and  the  conception  of  divin- 
ity worked  out  is  bold,  startling,  original,  yet  inspiring  in 
the  highest  degree. 

"One  of  the  finest  stories  in  contemporary  fiction."  —  Phila- 
delphia Record. 

"  Perhaps  the  most  powerful  novel  of  the  year."  —  Portsmouth 
Chronicle. 

"  A  work  of  unusual  power,  a  great  story  admirably  told."  — 
Ph ila delp h ia  Inqu irer. 

"  Wonderfully  picturesque  and  out  of  the  common."  —  Port- 
land Free  Press. 

"  Has  the  restless  sweep  of  the  sea."  —  Sunday  Oregonian. 

"  Probably  destined  to  be  one  of  the  most  discussed  of  modern 
publications."  —  Los  Angeles  Times. 

u  A  story  that  will  find  a  permanent  place  in  literature."  — 
Baltimore  News. 

"  A  work  really  great  in  the  keen  human  interest  from  first  to 
last  chapter." —  Chicago  Record-Herald. 

"  A  masterly  study  of  the  simpler  types  of  humanity.  The 
spirit  of  the  book  is  frank  and  pure."  —  Albany  Argus. 

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